Online status changed to approved

[dublin2dunedin]

Online status changed to approved last Thursday!

My timeline:

April 2010: came to NZ on student visa to study PhD at Uni of Otago.
April 2013: handed in PhD. Yay!
June 2013: Went back home to Ireland for a few months while waiting for PhD to be corrected and passed so could apply for Graduate Job Search Visa. Bit of pain having to go home for this, but only other option was to hang around on a tourist visa and didn't have the $$.
October 2013: PhD finally all corrected and signed off
November 2013: came back to NZ. Applied for Graduate Job Search Visa via Dunedin office. Applied on the Tuesday, got it on the Thursday!
December 2013: offer of skilled employment in ChCh. Submitted EOI 23 Dec. (Offer of employment also with an accredited employer, but decided just to go for the straight up Skilled Migrant category rather than Work to Residence)
Jan 2014: EOI selected from the pool. Also started work in ChCh
27 Feb 2014: dropped all supporting documents off to ChCh office in Addington. Had redone medicals in April 2013 for last few months of student visa, so didn't have to do them again.
10 May 2014: email to say case officer assigned
15 May 2014: case officer called my manager to double check about job info.
22 May 2014: online status changed to approved.

[JandM]

[dublin2dunedin]

On hand to answer any questions about the student visa to residency transition

I will say that it's not an automatic thing: do you get points for having an NZ qualification (especially at postgraduate level) but the real clincher is to have the work experience or an NZ job offer/job!

[omooba14]

@dublin2dunedin,I am quite fascinated by your storyline,could you share your phd life experience-the 2010 to 2013 including life and living?

[dublin2dunedin]

@dublin2dunedin,I am quite fascinated by your storyline,could you share your phd life experience-the 2010 to 2013 including life and living?

Can you be a bit more specific in your questions?

[omooba14]

Can you be a bit more specific in your questions?

how was the phd study life times? were you on full scholarship or self sponsorship? what was your relationship with your professors like? how did you handle being home sick?

[dublin2dunedin]

- PhD was okay, I wasn't really that into my topic so that made it drag
- full scholarship. Uni of Otago Doctoral Scholarship
- relationship with supervisor was ... okay
- yeah, I had sort of underestimated how tough it would be being so far from home and so skint

[omooba14]

- PhD was okay, I wasn't really that into my topic so that made it drag
- full scholarship. Uni of Otago Doctoral Scholarship
- relationship with supervisor was ... okay
- yeah, I had sort of underestimated how tough it would be being so far from home and so skint

please,what was the criteria of getting scholarship?

[jawnbc]

Congratulations Dr.!

[dublin2dunedin]

Scholarship criteria here: http://www.otago.ac.nz/study/scholar...ago014687.html