HI
My wife and two daughters came to the USA on F-2 Visa as my dependents. Subsequently she obtained F-1 visa for a graduate program. In 2009 Fall, She was informed from her school that they are going to start an advanced program than what she does now. Further, she was informed that most of her credits could be transferred towards the new advanced grad program which she really wanted to do. However, if she continued with the current program for next semester (Spring 2010), she would have completed her degree and have to graduate thus cannot transfer her credits towards the proposed advanced program. Therefore she wanted to somehow skip the spring semester as she plans to pursue the new program in fall 2010.
So the International student office's (ISO) advise was
1. Either to go back to home country during spring 2010.
or
2. Change the status to H4(I m a H1B holder until 09-2012).

Therefore, we applied for H4 (wife and two daughters) in December 2009 and wife did not register for any classes for spring 2010.

I received the denial notice yesterday for I539 and she is required to depart the USA on the basis that she did not maintain her F1 status. She was not advised by the ISO to register for classes. However, now the damage has been done.

I would really appreciate if somebody would help me on following questions;

1.Is there any appeal process (it is not mentioned in the denial notice) solution without going back to country.

2. If the only solution is to go back to home country, is there any grace period? (Is it starting from the denial notice date?)

3. Will this affect (will get denied) to a new F-1 visa for the new program from the home country due to this out of status issue?