Florida [Images] Atlantic University in the United States has received widespread criticism after an error in filing visa applications for 16 Indian school teachers, in the country on a cultural exchange programme, which could have led to their deportation.

The university has also come under fire from the State Department for paying the experienced teachers, what they call, 'poverty' wages.

As a result of the errors in the visa applications, the teachers, who have been teaching in public schools in the St Lucie County school district, have been on unpaid leave since February 8. The Palm Beach Post had reported that the teachers were scheduled to be deported on March 9 if their visas weren't extended.

FAU president Frank Brogan has admitted that the university's department of international-student affairs was responsible for the error, adding that the department would be reorganised.

The teachers are expected to be back at work this week.

Adding to FAU's woes, the State Department, which has funded the exchange program, has come down strongly on the university for hiring experienced teachers and paying them low wages.

The Post reported that all 16 teachers hold master's degrees and have multiple years of experience. The teachers were hired as interns and according to their contract, were to be paid as interns for half the year and as regular teachers for the rest of the year. However, only $5,000 of the teachers' salaries was paid to them by the school district, while the rest was sent to FAU to cover the programme's administration costs.

Brogan said the money given to FAU was used to hire mentors for the teachers, to help teachers find housing, and to hold orientation sessions in India, adding that the university had, in fact, lost money on the programme.

He also said that the Indian teachers were aware of the salary when they agreed to participate in the programme and were paid the same as US teaching interns.

However, Stanley Colvin of the department's Office of Exchange Designation and Coordination, in a strongly worded letter, told the FAU, "To pay the master's level-educated teachers with three to five years' experience a wage at or below poverty level may be interpreted by some as a form of peonage or servitude imposed upon foreign nationals by a State Department-designated sponsor".