Xiling Shen, a biomedical engineering professor at Duke University, grew up in Shanghai, China and came to the United States to attend Stanford University, from which he has three degrees. On the surface, his connections to Israel are not evident.
Professor Xiling Shen in Israel
Yet last winter, Shen spent 10
days in Israel on a trip through Jewish National Fund-USA’s (JNF-USA) Faculty Fellowship Program in Israel. The
program brings university and college faculty members on a sponsored trip to Israel
to conduct research and meet other scholars.
“When I came to the U.S., all
my advisers and mentors were Jewish,” Shen said. “So when I heard about this
opportunity, I wanted to learn more about Jewish culture. There’s something
that really holds them together, something special about all the Jewish
colleagues and advisers I’ve had.”
Shen said he did not realize
how small Israel was until he traveled there — he estimated that he went back
and forth across the country five times. He also said he found some
similarities between Jewish and East Asian cultures, particularly in their
emphasis on community. He did, however, have a connection to Judaism growing up
— his stepfather was Jewish, although he hadn’t explored that side in great
depth.
Faculty Fellowship in Israel participants stand in front of the Western Wall in Jerusalem
Israel is an agricultural
powerhouse despite most of its land being desert, so Shen, with his background
in biomedical engineering, was interested in learning about Israeli
innovations.
“It’s so fascinating. It goes
against all your intuition,” Shen said. “It just shows how engineering can
overcome obstacles that seem completely insurmountable. They have all these
environmental innovations.”
With support from the JNF
Boruchin Center and Jewish National Fund-USA Major Donors, the Faculty Fellowship Program started in
2008 as a response to growing anti-Semitism on college campuses and has since
grown to nearly 400 alumni. René Reinhard, the program’s executive director,
said many participants say the trip is life-transforming and that Israel was
very different than their preconceived notions.
“Unfortunately, the media
often portrays Israel through the prism of the conflict,” said Reinhard. “To counter
this, the Faculty Fellowship Program in Israel enables participants to meet
with Israelis from all walks of life who are working together to create a
positive future for Israel and the world.”
Vivian Grossman, vice
president of marketing for JNF-USA, was on the trip with Shen. Grossman said
professors who participate in the program come from a variety of disciplines
and are often oblivious to anti-Semitic activity on their campuses.
“We encourage them, from start
to finish, to ask plenty of questions,” Grossman said. “They hear from people
who are Jews, Druze, Christians, Arabs, Bedouins, Palestinians. Left, right,
center, religious, and secular. They are exposed to thought leaders in each and
every community in Israel.”
Grossman and Shen discussed
their respective backgrounds on the trip — Grossman said Shen lives a life of
purpose and is driven in his area of expertise. After the trip, Shen was eager
to go back and talk with his stepfather, having a new lens from which to engage
with him.
Shen has continued to
collaborate with the people he met through the program. He visited the Weizmann
Institute of Science to learn from cancer researchers and found that they took
a different approach to finding a cure than he was used to.
“We always think of it from a
reductionist approach,” Shen said. “But if we think about the symptom of the
cancer patient, we often don’t take a holistic approach. Meeting with them made
me realize that there are many aspects of cancer we’re not exploring from a
more systematic approach. We need to present students with a more balanced
view.”
For more information on
JNF-USA’s Faculty Fellowship in Israel program, visit ff2israel.org.