Advice/thoughts on school discovering status...

I am a second year master's student at NYU. I was excited to head back for the first day of the new semester tomorrow, until I noticed an email from my academic advisor informing that he had received an e-mail from accounts payable inquiring about my status as a citizen, saying that I was born in Singapore (I was born in Malaysia and entered with a 6 month tourist visa when I was three and I've been here ever since). In the application to NYU I clicked US citizen (can't leave things blank online), but on any governmental forms I've left blank when it comes to that question. I'm on a full scholarship, plus stipend--hence the finance office calling.

It looks like I have to come out to my advisor and the department head tomorrow, but I'm wondering if I should speak with a lawyer first, perhaps avoiding discussing the issue in person at school until I've received legal advice. I don't want anything I say to come back to hurt me or my parents.

Can anyone think of any reasons why I might need to wait to talk to my advisor/professors? Anyone know if NYU has a track record dealing with this issue?

Thanks in advance.

not a problem.

Are you working as a research assistant? If you are just a student, and not getting paid for your TA or RA work, I don't know why they would even care. Not sure if talking to a lawyer would help. I would come out to the adviser first. Good luck! i really hope it works out for you.

Sorry if I'm being nosy, but what do you study? And how on earth did you manage to get a scholarship from NYU??? Did they not care about your status or anything?

I think you would be in trouble if they found out about your status after been getting a full scholarship all these years.

There must be on campus organizations or activist groups who deal with undocumented students. Reach out to them first if you can. They might be able to help you out. If you have exceptional academic standing, that will help out as well. And also, don't rule out contacting Senator Schumer and Bloomberg's offices.

If that resource is available within the school they might be able to reach out to someone that may help. In the meantime contacting a lawyer is not a bad idea, but the lawyer will certainly be worried about the scholarship. If it has any contribution from federal funds, if it was a public scholarship or if it required USC status to apply or PR status this might be an issue where legal help might be useful. If it's a private scholarship than your odds would be better of finding a reasonable solution.

What kind of scholarship do you have? If it requires citizenship, then you are in big trouble. I hope you didn't lie about your status when applying for scholarship.

Looks like your scholarship may depend on your status as a citizen

My advice: Lawyer up. Tell them everything is in process. Blame your parents for bringing you here at such an early age if you have to.

Definitely talk to a lawyer and an advisor at your school.

Basically if it was a full merit scholarship, you should be good (they consider everyone for those). But if your scholarship, as others have said, required you to be of some type of status, then there could be big trouble considering you lied about it on the application. Hopefully it wont be anything too serious, but definitely talk to a few people and your advisor, or better an advisor at NYU you know well.