Heres some info that might help some of you here. My OPT expires on Oct. I am going to start my paperwork for H1 next week from my company. Just to be on the safe side, I am also planning to enroll for Spring 06 sems. I talked with International student advisors and got some infos about it. I have to get admitted in the new program "before the the grace period of 60 days". I cannot apply for adm within these 60 days but it has to be in OPT period itself. Once I get admitted, it can be anytime within 60 days grace period that I can transfer from my current school/program to newly admitted program. When I get a new I20(within grace period), I can be in lawful student status for a total of 5 months(can be in the country) including those grace period(in my case, oct05-nov,nov-dec,dec-jan,jan-feb,feb-mar06). The bottom line is the program should start no late than 5 months from OPT expiration...this is what i understand so far, let me know where i am wrong. It will be helpful to me...