Visiting Scholars Program

The Visiting Scholar program at John Jay College involves two processes. The first process is focused on verifying that the proposed visitor will add usefully to the academic discourse of the College, and that the required details of the visit and proper documents are present. The Office manages that process for the Advancement of Research, and all letters of invitation to visiting scholars must come from this office.

All Visiting Scholars must have an academic Point of Contact (faculty member, research staff, etc.) at the College. Scholars wishing to visit John Jay are encouraged to contact a faculty member or chairperson of an appropriate academic department to inquire about sponsorship. Requests must be endorsed in writing by the Chair of an academic department, Center Director, or other college Executive Officer.

Visiting scholar requests should follow these instructions:

1. Establish a single point-of-contact (POC) for the visiting scholar within an academic department or center. POCs are responsible for seeking the approval of the Chair or Director.  The POC will serve as a point of reference for the scholar, the Office for the Advancement of Research (OAR), and, if necessary, the Enrollment Management Office.

2. POCs should work with scholars to complete the following and return to Tannan Wilson in OAR, tawilson@jjay.cuny.edu, at least two months before the visit.

• A letter from the POC indicating their request to invite the visiting scholar and a short description of how the visitor is expected to contribute to the academic discourse of the College.  A start and end date must be included in the request. In an effort to better integrate visiting scholars into the academic community, hosts are encouraged to schedule scholars visiting for more than three months for a public seminar during their visit. These plans should be discussed in the invitation letter. All invitation letters must be co-signed by the Chair of the sponsoring department or Center Director.
• A copy of the scholar’s C.V.
• A letter from the scholar’s home institution endorsing their visit to John Jay.

OAR will initiate a review of these invitations on a case-by-case basis and will notify the Department and POC.

The second part of the process is focused on verifying that a non-citizen visitor is eligible for the Exchange Visitor Program and, if so, assisting with immigration. The Office of Enrollment Management assists with this process:

3. For international scholars utilizing the J-1 Exchange Visitor Program: after receiving approval from OAR, POCs should work with visitors to complete the international scholar application (http://www.jjay.cuny.edu/academics/5656.php) available through the Enrollment Management Office  and return it with all necessary documents to Inga Mezale, Deputy  Director of International Students and Scholars, 524 West 59^th Street, Admission’s Office, New York, NY 10019.  These materials will be used to issue the Form DS-2019 which is the document the visitor will need (along with the supporting materials) to obtain their J-1 visa from the U.S. Embassy in their home country to enter the United States. The Enrollment Management Office will contact the POC should additional information be needed.  If no additional information is needed, the documents needed for the visitor to obtain their J-1 visa will be sent to them via UPS International mail.

4. POCs should notify OAR of the arrival of the scholar and the date(s) of any public seminars no less than two weeks in advance of the scholar’s arrival.

5. OAR will work with visiting scholars to provide them with a special John Jay ID that provides them building, library and facility access during the duration of their stay. Scholars whose stay is longer than 3 months may be issued a John Jay electronic ID and email account for the duration of their stay which will also give them off-site access to the library’s licensed electronic resources. Visitors will not be provided with borrowing privileges from the library, but can utilize their POCs to borrow materials and for access to Department resources such as photocopying facilities.

OAR does not provide resources other than those stated in #5 above to visiting scholars. POCs and Department Chairs/Center Directors should determine in advance if a desk, office, or laboratory will be provided by the Department/Center during the scholars visit. All resources provided by the Department should be outlined in the request letter sent to OAR. For those visitors who might be capable of contributing to the academic mission of the College by teaching a class or classes, a separate request to serve as an adjunct instructor must be sent by the POC to the Provost’s Office. A copy of the Visiting Scholar application that is submitted to OAR should be included with the request to the Provost.