The US Ambassador to Ghana, Virginia Palmer, has expressed the commitment of the US Embassy to clear the backlog of visa applications from prospective Ghanaian students seeking to pursue studies in the US.
She said the embassy was working effectively to get students’ visa interview appointments on time to aid successful ones to travel ahead of time.
Ms Palmer encouraged students desiring to undertake undergraduate, postgraduate and doctorate degrees in the US not to be discouraged by delayed appointment interviews in applying to US universities.
In welcoming prospective students, Ms Palmer said she has been permitted to take every officer with the Consulate and put them to work on the visa line. She said this at the opening of the 2022 Education USA College Fair in Accra.
She encouraged people who needed to go to the United States to go ahead and apply for visas since the Consulate section has opened up a lot of appointments for non-emigrants.
The two-day fair brought together about 40 high education institutions in the US. It was meant to offer the students accurate, comprehensive and current information about opportunities for students to study at accredited universities in the US.
Participating universities were Howard University, Drexel University, Emory University School of Law, Millersville University, Iowa State University of Science and Technology and Middle Tennessee State University.
The rest were the New York Institute of Technology, Northeastern University, Taxes Technology University, PACE University, Webster University, University of Houston-Victoria, University of Arizona and University of Kentucky.
The embassy has introduced an “Interview waiver programme” to support people who already had expired visas to renew them without going to the physical embassy.
“You can just send visa applications to us by mail, and renewals are very straightforward,” she assured the public.
She also said the embassy had instituted a procedure by which prospective students could request expedited visa appointments.
With about 4,200 students studying currently in 630 different educational institutions in the US in 2021 alone, Ms Palmer said Ghana was the second highest “sender” of students to the US.
Additionally, the ambassador indicated that Ghana was among the top 25 countries globally that sent graduate students to the United States.
She encouraged Ghanaian students to go and study in the United States.
The Deputy Minister of Education, Rev. John Ntim Fordjour, was happy that education had kept the bond between Ghana and the US together over the years.
He noted that the partnership with the US Embassy had been mutual, enabling Ghana to enjoy teaching and learning materials from the US Embassy.
