|
Change of status
At the end of their studies, most foreign students decide to get
back to their country, to put at its service their new experience
(especially the grant holders who, in return of the grant which
they obtained, pledged to participate actively in the economy of
their country).
However, someone want to settle durably in France. They must then
change status, that is change the temporary permit with " student
" mention into another status giving them more rights, especially
that to exercise a fully-fledged professional activity.
This change of status is very difficult to obtain because it goes
against the official doctrine that successive Ministers of the Interior
have been recalling for years, since the seventies : " the foreign
student has vocation to put his skill at the service of his country
after his studies ".
On the other hand, a student can acquire a right to stay and work
in France because of the modification of his family situation or
more rarely the importance of the duration of his usual place of
residence in France.
Change of family situation : A
change of family situation, marriage or birth of a child, can open
the way to certain rights, according to the nationality of the spouse
or the child.
Marriage with a foreigner
A foreign student who gets married in France to a foreigner with
a temporary residence permit with license of work or residence permit
can change status and obtain the same permit as his/her spouse,
subject to the regularity of the stay. In that case it is not the
student who changes status but the spouse who asks for the " right
of immigrants to bring their family with them " in its favour, a
procedure strictly restricted, and demanding, especially for the
resources and lodging criteria.
Marriage with a French national
A foreign student married for at least one year with a French national
is delivered a residence permit (10 years) provided there is community
of life (and subject to the regularity of the stay). During the
first wedding year, he can ask for a temporary " private and domestic
life " residence permit if he proves a regular entrance in France.
Birth of a French child
With the exception of the Algerians, the foreign student parents
of a French minor child have the right to a residence card (10 years)
subject to the regularity of the stay at the time of the request
(or at least a temporary " private and domestic life " residence
permit).
Conjugal life
To give evidence of your life of married couple,
you can be asked : a EDF/GDF receipt ; a tax notice ; a documentary
evidence of a joint account in a bank or in the Post office
; a receipt of rent ; a lease. Even if you have produced all
these documents, know that the authorities can, if they consider
it necessary, to start a police inquiry to check the community
of life.
|
Change of status for the duration of your
stay : The article 15 of the ordinance of November 2,
1945 foresees that the foreigners who have been in regular situation
in France for more than ten years obtain automatically a 10 years
resident permit if they were for this period a holder of a temporary
residence permit with the " student " mention. So, if
for the past ten years, a foreign student was a holder of another
permit with the " student " mention, he is entitled to
ask for the residence permit.
Change of status due to a job
: The foreign student who wants to change status to work as a wage-earner
must obtain a working license with the mention " salarié
" (wage-earner) on his permit. He must first look for an employer,
who establishes a promise of hiring then deposits a file with the
prefecture.
If nothing in the current legislation opposes to it, this type of
demand has nevertheless not little chance to succeed because the
administration puts forward the current situation of the employment
in France. Only the students foreign to whom the employment situation
is not opposable because of their nationality or who prove a high-level
starting salary or of particular skill (computer specialists in
the circular of July 16, 1998) succeed in obtaining it.
Besides, the request is risky : a refusal of working license ends
mostly with a refusal of stay accompanied with an invitation to
leave the territory within one month. In that case, it is very difficult
to reverse the procedure and to ask to benefit again from the "
student " status because prefectures consider generally that
the request for working license demonstrates that the person concerned
has ended its studies.
For further information concerning the change of status as well
as the narrow way which leads to the French nationality, we recommend
you the publications of the GISTI (see " Focus " at the
end of this part of the guide).
Hard access to information
Rima Anis Raad, Lebanese, post-graduate in law
in Paris-I university, mastère in Law and Management
(HEC).
" The information concerning the status and the procedure
to be followed does not reach in a satisfying way the foreign
students. There is no free telephon number which centralizes
all the information to this public. The reception services of
the prefecture of police do not appear to know a lot about the
services that deal with their cases ; they are sometimes shaken
from a service to another unsuccessfully. To obtain just a piece
of information, it is necessary to go on the spot, to queue
up, to undergo all sorts of control, to take a ticket, to wait
for one's moment and to deposit a file. All this time to ask
a single question. The opaqueness of the information as for
the rights and the obligations of the foreign students contributes
to increasing their confusion and their psychological apprehension
of the administration. "
Source : account "
A foreigner student in France : daily complexity", extracted
from Etre étudiant étranger au 21e siècle
(a foreign student in the 21st century) published in June 2001
by the Cité internationale universitaire (CIUP) of Paris
and the magazine L'Etudiant on the occasion of a conference
staged on October 20, 2000 by C.I.U.P.for its 75th anniversary.
|
|
The temporary "scientist" and "artistic and cultural
profession" residence permits
