I have two pals who came as tourist and changed their status to F1 aka student. As a matter of fact, they are doing extremly well, which essentially means, owns a house, has a well paying job and so on and so forth. But they did come about 8 years ago. Donno what happened after spet. 11. I think your best bet is changing your status to F1. Bhandya ni feri. I have no idea how easy/hard or if at all possible. Good luck! IndisGuise:)