This is an AAO appeal decision — a case denied once and appealed. It shows how the framework is applied; it is not the filing population.
The Petitioner, a psychologist, proposed to operate a nonprofit organization providing trauma-informed mental health counseling, paraprofessional training, and cultural heritage-based economic programming primarily serving Albanian and Spanish-speaking immigrant communities in New York.
Field: psychology / mental health services · Read the decision (uscis.gov)
EB-2 threshold — addressed
SCOPS and AAO both agreed the Petitioner qualified as an advanced degree professional; threshold EB-2 was not at issue.
Prong 1 — national importancenot established · dispositive
“it is not apparent how this would have a significant national impact.”
“A mere potential contribution to various matters of national-level interest does not establish that a proposed endeavor is of national importance.”
“Generalized conclusory statements that do not identify a specific impact to the field have little probative value.”
“the endeavor he proposed in response to the RFE was only focused on two specific communities in two parts of [redacted].”
“It is not clear how this level of employment over five years would represent significant job creation or economic activity consistent with a national level impact.”
AAO decision text
How the evidence was treated
- business plan · discounted
“The Petitioner provided a business plan projecting that it would hire 20 individuals over a five-year period.”
AAO decision text - other · discounted
“a proposed endeavor merely contributing to a national issue that is subject to a government priority or initiative is not reflective of a potential prospective national impact.”
AAO decision text - resume experience · discounted
“a petitioner's expertise and record of success is a consideration under Dhanasar's second prong, which 'shifts the focus from the proposed endeavor to the foreign national.'”
AAO decision text
Where this case turned
- Economic claims unsupported · p1 — job/revenue projections with no corroborating basis
- Endeavor too vague · p1 — described as a job role, not a defined undertaking
- Field importance conflated with endeavor · p1 — argues the field matters, not the specific endeavor
- Local, not national scope · p1 — impact confined to clients / a region
Notable
The AAO declined to consider new telehealth-expansion arguments raised for the first time on appeal, citing Matter of Furtado and Matter of Soriano, because the Petitioner had been put on notice via RFE and given a reasonable opportunity to submit that evidence earlier. The AAO also noted that the Petitioner's proposed endeavor shifted materially between the initial filing (generic skills-based assertions), the RFE response (localized nonprofit for two immigrant communities in specific New York neighborhoods), and the appeal (national telehealth expansion), undermining the coherence of the national-importance showing. The AAO drew an explicit contrast with the Dhanasar petitioner's hypersonic propulsion research and government funding to illustrate what a nationally important endeavor looks like.
What this case teaches
Analyst reading of the decision text.
Petitioner repeatedly shifted and narrowed the endeavor's description (generic skills, then hyper-local two-community nonprofit, then vague telehealth expansion), never establishing that the localized endeavor's impact was national in scale rather than merely aligned with national priorities.
Define the endeavor concretely and consistently from filing through RFE; show with specific evidence how its scale extends beyond localized service to national-level impact, not mere alignment with government priorities.
vague
public_health · government_interest · economic_job_creation · geographic_or_shortage_area
person_focused
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