The title on the offer settles nothing on its own. What matters is which Appendix 2 entry the duties fall under and whether the applicant meets that entry's own rule. A chemistry graduate performing professional analytical work qualifies under the Chemist entry even where the employer calls the post a technologist role.
Match the duties to an entry, then match yourself to that entry's rule
Two findings are needed and they are independent. The position must fall within a profession that USMCA Appendix 2 actually lists, and the applicant must satisfy whatever that particular entry demands. The Chemist entry asks for a baccalaureate or licenciatura degree and nothing further about the workplace.
The Scientific Technician or Technologist entry asks instead for theoretical knowledge of a listed discipline together with work in direct support of a professional in that discipline, which is a statement about the receiving employer as much as about the applicant. A chemistry graduate hired to select methods, interpret results and take responsibility for findings fits the first entry comfortably. The same graduate hired to operate validated procedures under supervision may be better described by the second.
Where the description straddles both, the sensible step is to ask the employer which activity will occupy most of the week and to have the letter say so.
- USCIS: TN NAFTA Professionals
- U.S. Department of State: USMCA professional workers
- Department of State: 9 FAM 402.17, TN and TD guidance
- eCFR: 8 CFR 214.6, Citizens of Canada or Mexico seeking temporary entry as business persons
- eCFR: 8 CFR 103.2, submission and adjudication of benefit requests
- USCIS: Form G-1055, Fee Schedule