The Rhodes Scholarship for study at Oxford University in England is one of the most prestigious scholarships offered in the United States. This year, nine hundred sixty-three students from three hundred sixty-six American colleges and universities applied. Thirty-two students were selected to receive the scholarship -- one of them a young immigrant from China who came to this country barely four and a half years ago. Here is his story today on New American Voices.
Twenty-year-old Wen Shi seems a typical American college student with his brushed-back crew cut, rimless glasses, Detroit Redwings sweatshirt and easy manner. But not so typically, in October he?ll become a Rhodes Scholar, off to Oxford University for three years to study molecular oncology.
Wen Shi came to the United States in 1999 to join his father, a computer salesman living in Michigan. The elder Shi had emigrated from Beijing in 1985 when Wen was three years old, looking for a better future for himself and his son. Wen Shi says that he would have gladly come to America earlier, but his grandparents, who raised him, didn?t want to let him go.
Enrolling in high school in Michigan, Wen Shi found his classmates to be tolerant and accepting. He says the school did not have many immigrants, but it was a diverse place with students of different ethnic, racial and religious backgrounds, willing to welcome newcomers such as Wen Shi.
The only hurdle that he had to overcome, Wen Shi says, was English. He had taught himself the language in China, but still had difficulty reading a lot and writing essays in English for his social studies and humanities classes. But he took some classes in English as a Second Language, and by the time he finished high school two years later, he had accumulated enough college credits to complete the four-year university program at Johns Hopkins in just three years. Wen Shi says he chose Johns Hopkins because it is a well-known research university, and also because he received a Bloomberg scholarship, which covers an entire course of study at Johns Hopkins. Wen Shi majored in biology, and worked part-time assisting in cancer research at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He was also very active in extracurricular activities.
In his four and a half years in America, Wen Shi has been focused on his academic and volunteer work. He says he has had no time for dating -- romance would be a distraction at this point in his life. He has some advice for other young immigrants planning to come to America seeking a new life.
Wen Shi sees the Rhodes Scholarship and the opportunity of studying at Oxford as setting him on the path to achieving his life?s goal -- combining his interest in medical research and passion for community service by making a substantial contribution to finding a cure for cancer.