AAO research

AAO EB-1A decision MAY272020_05B2203: Awards

EB-1A awards — AAO decision MAY272020_05B2203: Appeal dismissed. Review source status, procedural posture and the official USCIS PDF.

Decision summary: AAO decision MAY272020_05B2203: Appeal dismissed. Awards, published material, original contributions, and high salary were not established. The case also reserved continue-work and prospective-benefit issues as unnecessary. (pp. 3–10).

Source limitation: The review record contains a source hold or limitation. Read the limitation below before relying on any case detail; unresolved facts are not treated as findings.

Scope classification from review: in_scope_EB1A_source_reviewed. This is a source-review label, not a legal conclusion.

Decision snapshot

Decision ID	MAY272020_05B2203
Decision date as printed	May 27, 2020
Classification / field stated in source	Non-precedent EB-1A appeal by a mathematics educator who taught elementary/middle school and coached competitive mathematics teams in China. (pp. 1–2)
Procedural posture	AAO dismissed the appeal after agreeing petitioner had not met at least three criteria; the Director had found two: judging and authorship of scholarly articles. (pp. 1–3)
Operative disposition	Appeal dismissed.
Final-merits status	No formal final-merits determination; threshold was unmet. AAO nonetheless stated aggregate review did not support acclaim/top-of-field eligibility. (pp. 10–11)

What the AAO decision addressed

Awards, published material, original contributions, and high salary were not established. The case also reserved continue-work and prospective-benefit issues as unnecessary. (pp. 3–10)

Criterion-by-criterion status in this source

These labels reproduce the source-review record. “Not considered,” “not reached,” and “not coded” do not mean the criterion failed. A Director finding recited as background is not an AAO holding unless the decision says so.

Criterion	Source-review status
Awards	not met Coach titles/“Golden Coach” evidence was inconsistent, incomplete, and did not establish national/international recognition as prizes for excellence. (pp. 3–5) — source PDF
Membership	Not coded — source PDF
Published material about the person	not met Articles’ placement/circulation was not shown to qualify as major media; connection to People’s Daily was unsubstantiated. (pp. 5–6) — source PDF
Judging the work of others	met The record reflected service on the judging committee for World Math Competition (China trials); Director’s finding accepted. (p. 2) — source PDF
Original contributions of major significance	not met Letters, textbook evidence and claimed TV educational role did not establish an original contribution of major significance to mathematics education. (pp. 6–9) — source PDF
Scholarly authorship	met The record reflected co-authorship/editing of mathematics textbooks and educational publications; Director’s finding accepted. (p. 2) — source PDF
Artistic display or showcases	Not coded — source PDF
Leading or critical role	Not coded — source PDF
High salary or remuneration	not met The record lacked sufficient reliable China-specific comparative salary evidence; U.S. wage comparisons were not relevant. (pp. 9–10) — source PDF
Commercial success in the performing arts	Not coded — source PDF

Source holds and limits

A non-precedent decision; keep cited Chinese media names transliterated as shown and avoid claiming broader reach beyond what the decision established. Adverse.

How this record may be used in research

Comparison scope: If cleared for publication, create a decision-specific, page-cited summary that states the field and procedural posture, distinguishes criteria met/not met/not reached, links the USCIS source PDF, preserves redactions, and clearly labels the decision non-precedent. Potential comparison: Narrow comparison for mathematics educators: judging and textbook authorship can be separately credited, while coach honors, media reach, field-wide impact, and geographically relevant salary evidence remain distinct questions.

Page-level source trail

Use the official PDF and the cited physical page numbers to check each statement.

Open the official USCIS decision PDF. Page-specific citations were not available in the normalized row.

How to use this record

This is a historical, nonprecedent AAO decision about its own administrative record. It is not a prediction, success rate, or current filing instruction. Compare the issue and procedural stage before drawing an analogy. The current framework is in the USCIS Policy Manual, Volume 6, Part F, Chapter 2.

Related corpus research

Full-corpus research index
Awards research
Published material about the person research
Judging the work of others research
Original contributions of major significance research
Scholarly authorship research
High salary or remuneration research
Athletics sector research
Medicine sector research
Teaching sector research

Browse the AAO decision index · Read EB-1A evidence guides · Review source and correction methodology.

Primary source

Official USCIS AAO decision PDF for MAY272020_05B2203