Order 506345: public policy

Professional contribution: As a founder of an educational consulting company, I’ve been successfully training new teachers and consultants, and been helping hundreds students got into their dream colleges.

Public service contribution:

“Mom, are you ok?” this was the message that I kept sending to my mom on July 5th, 2009, unfortunately no replies. I also tried to call countless times, couldn’t go through, as our government unusually shut down mobile phone communication as well as internet.

Mom was in Urumqi, Xinjiang, China, where I was raised up and millions of Uygurs live. But on July 5th, 2009, at least 1,000 Uygurs began a protest but soon escalated into violent attacks targeting han people. At the time, all I was thinking is to at least make a phone call to make sure she is ok. A few days later, I finally got a call from mom saying she is safe. But news reported, hundreds of people died in the riot. It has been more than 8 years, but the tension between Uygurs and Han are still high, hundreds of unrests happened during this time.

So I am confused how I can help change the situation. As an educator, first thing I thought of is to help through education or education policy.

Over the years, I flew back to my community every single year. Talk to community members and help Han people understand the value of Uygurs and vice versa, and hope to make a little difference. I organized at least two sodalities between Han people and Uygurs every single year in hope to reduce misunderstandings. It was tremendous success, our community became one of the safest communities in Xinjiang. I am hoping to extend these event to more places in Xinjiang and make bigger difference.