Xiong’s Story

Xiong had been Deaf since birth. She moved to the United States from China in 2011 and got married. Sadly, soon after her husband passed away. She now needed to become a naturalized citizen. Xiong contacted CIL for help. She did not know English well, did not have transportation to get to CIL, and did not have a computer to help her get through the citizenship process. CIL’s Deaf Voice team stepped into action, printed instructions in Chinese for Xiong and mailed them to her home so she could get started.

Xiong’s family helped her complete the first application form and made an appointment to bring Xiong to CIL to fill out the second form. CIL’s Deaf Voice team discussed the filing fees and reviewed the checklist of steps that Xiong needed to take in order for the application to proceed smoothly. She filled out the paperwork, got a money order for the fees, and mailed them to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Several weeks later, Xiong received a response – her application had been rejected! She scheduled another appointment to meet with CIL’s Deaf Voice team. Fortunately, the Deaf Voice team found that the rejection was only because Xiong had sent in her application on an outdated form, but she could resubmit her application at any time. She obtained another money order and once again mailed the application, this time with the correct form. Just two weeks later she received another reply scheduling her for fingerprinting and telling her she would be scheduled for an in person interview. She was fingerprinted and then waited for her interview to be arranged. While she was waiting, CIL’s Deaf Voice team showed her a video detailing the interview process to prepare her. After nine long months her interview was finally scheduled.

As Xiong was Deaf, this presented a challenge for her as sign language is not a universal language and she was still fairly unfamiliar with English. But that didn’t deter her and she completed practice tests using her phone to translate the questions from English to Chinese. Before the test Xiong prepared by practicing to better understand the questions she would be asked. In addition, CIL’s Deaf Voice team worked to teach her American Sign Language and English vocabulary to assist her in her taking the test.

After the test, Xiong was excited to contact CIL’s Deaf Voice team and let them know that she had passed the test and was now a naturalized U.S. citizen!