J-1 Visa Summer Work Travel Program

How you could spend your next summer vacation?
Get a J-1 Visa Summer Work Travel Program

Carol deSantis was not looking forward to her summer vacations in Cebu City, in the Philippines. For one, it would be the thick of the cyclone season, and over the last decade, her little country had been battered and hammered every time she was at home for school vacations. She also knew that the two months would pass in housework and boring TV shows.

One day, one of her teachers asked her how she’d like to spend her summer in the United States. Could she? Really? The United States was by far the most exciting country she hoped she would visit one day. She even had relatives there.

Her teacher thought there might be an exchange program designed for students who wanted to experience American life and culture during their summer break months.

That was how Carol learned about the United States Summer Work and Travel Program. If she could find a sponsor and get through the application process, she could actually visit the United States and experience life and culture there while studying as an exchange student and working at certain jobs to earn a little pocket money.

The J-1 Visa Summer Work Travel Program (SWTP) is undeniably one of the most popular exchange programs in the US Exchange Visitor Program. Of the 8.3 million people who have entered the US since 1987 on a J-1 exchange visitor visa, over 2.3 million have been exchange students in the Summer Work Travel Program. In 2008, 152,726 students went to the US under this visa, the highest ever.

The SWTP visa has been called “a cornerstone of U.S. public diplomacy” but it was also branded as a cheap labor scam after a 2011 investigation revealed widespread abuse and malpractice in the administration of the visa. Three years later, the State Department introduced a limit of 109,000, which also remains the current limit. The average in recent years has been about 105,000.

Applying for the SWTP J-1 Visa Summer Work Travel Program is not complicated. You could complete most of the process yourself quite easily by following the instructions and guidance you will receive if you join our Tourist & Student Visa Plan Finding a sponsor is a key milestone in the process, since they are required to guide you through the details of the application process once they accept you. For this reason, we don’t recommend paying a visa agency to help with your J-1 Visa Summer Work Travel Program application.

To learn more about Summer Travel and Work Program or explore your other visa options for visiting the United States, check out details of our professional visa plans to find one that’s perfectly tailored to your needs.