Support Alan's H1B visa extension

My name is Alan and I'm a science reporter for the Pulse at WHYY, the public radio station in Philadelphia. You may have heard my work from that program, or occasionally on NPR , or maybe a short podcast series I helped work on two years ago.

I really like my work. It's what I've always wanted to do, and I feel very grateful to have gotten to where I am today. I'm also fortunate that quite a few people enjoy my reporting.

Unfortunately, my future in this position is a bit uncertain at the moment, since I’m not an American citizen, and need to renew my H1B visa.

If I am to stay in the U.S., I'll also get to stay and work in the same country as my wife Clara who is working on her PhD in art history. I'll get to stay with my friends in Philadelphia, including the good people at the Philadelphia Dragon Boat Association , and the wonderful friends I've had the honor of meeting through our love of the podcast Buffering the Vampire Slayer (now called Buffering: A Rewatch Adventure.)

Extending my H1B work visa costs $7,500. There's a lot I can tell you about this visa, how it all works, and what it is like to try and get one, but these reporters have explained it far better than I can, so I encourage you to read their posts.

Extending my work visa will let me stay here for another three years. To some of you, this may sound familiar, and that's because I also crowdfunded my work visa three years ago.

The money goes towards: the filing fee for the visa extension, an additional fee for companies with more than 25 employees, the fee for the immigration lawyer working on this for myself and WHYY, and a processing fee so we do not have to wait months for a response.

The person collecting the money for the campaign is Sabrina, a close family friend who has generously offered to collect the money and send them on to WHYY. It's important for legal reasons that I never handle any of the money towards my work visa personally.

If you supported my campaign three years ago, thank you, and I hope that if you are able to, that you can support me one more time.

Thank you for reading thus far. Anything you can contribute will help, and please feel free to contact me with any questions you may have.

Also my cat Giles is here too and he's rather attached to Philadelphia (specifically various bits of my furniture.) He does not like being in his kitty carrier for more than 30 minutes so I guarantee you he will not like moving to another city or country. If not for me, do it for him?

Photo credit for the campaign photo goes to Kim Paynter. Thanks Kim!