Most of our M.A students are educators working for Jewish programs, day schools, and organizations. However, every year we have students coming from different backgrounds as well. Lili Ma graduated a week ago with M.A in education, specializing in Jewish education. Her motivation for taking this M.A is unusual and fascinating. We bring her story based on a brief interview taken shortly after the graduation ceremony.
How did you become interested in the field of Jewish education?
Between 2012-2015, after graduating with a bachelor's in English, I started working as the spokesperson as well as deputy head of cultural and academic affairs for the Consulate General of Israel in Shanghai. After that, I worked for an Israeli diamond company and was responsible for the local Chinese market until 2019. Since I've been working with Jewish colleagues for many years, and the local Chinese communities always regard the Jewish people as the smartest nation in the world, I've had some invitations by local libraries to be a guest speaker and talk about my "first-hand" experience of working with Jewish colleagues.
When I gave lectures about Israel and Jewish culture to local readers, from the questions, they frequently raised I came to realize how eager Chinese parents are to solve their kids' educational problems. They were so curious about what they could learn from the Jewish people regarding successful education. Their impression was also based on the high number of Jewish Nobel prize winners. They consider the Jewish nation to be 'a successful nation'.
I observed more and more problems relating to our current educational system in China. I started to realize that we need to explore, to some extent, a new vision for Chinese education, and I began to think seriously about what I could contribute from my own knowledge and experience. I consulted several professors from Sun Yat-sen University, a top university in China where I got my B.A. degree. They supported my thinking and agreed to write recommendation letters for me. In 2019 I applied to join the M.A program in Jewish Education at Hebrew University. I was fortunate enough to be admitted and started my two-year studies in the middle of March 2020 - the spring semester of that academic year, the fateful time when Covid-19 broke out globally.
The two years of full-time studies for the M.A degree in Jewish Education have been a turning point in my life; it significantly changed my personal life, as well as my professional life. In the beginning, my intention was just to use the two years to systematically explore the "fundamental secret" of the successful achievements of Jewish people in general - in business, academia, science, and so on. But in the second academic year, I found myself, as a non-Jew, essentially impressed and spiritually uplifted by the study of Biblical texts, as well as Midrash and Talmud. They shed light on our whole lives: where we came from, how we are expected to lead our lives, and where we will go to. I started to feel that I myself was gaining the benefit of a Jewish education.
What insights did you gain during your studies regarding Jewish education as a system?
The Jewish education emphasizes innovation. Already from the time of Abraham, Abraham was an innovator himself. Traditional Chinese education is the opposite. It had a lot to do with confirmity, and it's about how to follow and respect your authority. This is a key point that makes the difference.
One of the seminar papers I wrote compared Confucianism with Maimonides's theory of 'the golden way.' In this paper I was trying to claim that Maimonides's educational theory emphasizes healthy personal development, especially character development, while Confucianism views as a must to be in harmony with your surroundings, especially with your subordinates. I believe that this is one of the main factors that block innovation, especially in the scientific field. Another inspiring example from Jewish education is the Jewish coming of age bar and bat mitzvah rituals. The ceremony marks their beginning to be held accountable for their own actions. They become responsible for every word they speak or act they do towards the world. That makes them very independent and very innovative.
What would you do now with your new insights? Do you have plans for after graduation?
While studying, I started to rethink my future professional life and consider the possibility of becoming an educator myself, and how that might be a useful way of impacting other people's lives. What I'm doing now is looking for local opportunities to teach. I believe in the power of education and have a vision of using the educator role to turn the world into a better place. I feel I have found a way of combining my personal life with my professional life.