Shi Yigong and Rao Yi Headline NYT Article

The New York Times published an article today titled as "Fighting Trend, China Is Luring Scientists Home". It headlines the two prominent returnees, biologists Shi Yigong and Rao Yi, as examples how Chinese-born star scientists are now being lured back to their homeland.

What is surprising and interesting, though, is its mention of Rao Yi renouncing his American citizenship:

Rao Yi, a 47-year-old biologist who left Northwestern University in 2007 to become dean of the School of Life Sciences at Peking University in Beijing, contrasts China’s “soul-searching” with America’s self-satisfaction. When the United States Embassy in Beijing asked him to explain why he wanted to renounce his American citizenship, he wrote that the United States had lost its moral leadership after the 9/11 attacks. But “the American people are still reveling in the greatness of the country and themselves,” he said in a draft letter.

There was no words about Shi Yigong, who had been criticized in China for preaching/teaching patriotism to Chinese students while holding an American passport himself.

Talking about Shi Yigong's Salary

There is a usual routine in Chinese media in praising patriotic scholars returning from abroad to serve the motherland. Inevitably, they are described as giving up privileged academic positions, luxury houses, and fancy cars for a presumably much lesser environment in China. The description might have had some truth in it in the past couple of decades but it has gradually lost its base as China is more and more willing to spend big money luring oversea talents.

The most recent media star Professor Shi Yigong is being described in the same manner. Before returning to China, Shi Yigong was the Warner-Lambert/Parke-Davis Professor of molecular biology at Princeton University. So it is true that he had given up a lot in returning. He was made a professor and associated dean at Tsinghua University, one of the most privileged school in China. As the media campaign on his sacrifice continued, his salary at Tsinghua University became the talk of town.

A professor at the same college as Shi Yigong at Tshinghua University disclosed that Shi Yigong's salary is about 1.7 million RMB, which is roughly more than 200,000 in USD. If this figure is true, his salary will be at least compatible with what he earned at Princeton and more than ten times of other professors in the same Chinese school. So much for the sacrifice.

The issue received world-wide attention. A news report by Nature initially quoted the 1.7 million figure in describing how China is attracting top talents. The story drew a firestorm in its online comments and the magazine was forced to apologize and revise its content to exclude the exact figure.

Shi Yigong's colleague at Peking University, Professor Rao Yi, claimed that his salary is actually less than one million in RMB. Shi Yigong and Tsinghua University chose to remain silent. Fang Zhouzi is advocating for an open policy regarding salaries in public schools. He used examples of public schools in America disclosing professor salaries to illustrate that concerns of privacy do not apply in such a situation. Tsinghua University, like pretty much every other school in China, is a public and national institute.

Lately, Fang Zhouzi had been invited to present his case in a radio talk show.

Rao Yi Speaks Out on Shi Yigong's Grant Application

While the official media kept silent on the controversy of Shi Yigong's grant application yet hailing him as the new patriotic hero, Professor Rao Yi offered his personal views on the controversy. In fact, Rao Yi blamed the deafening silence of the grant authority as being unfair to Shi Yigong.

Rao Yi asserts that only the grant authority has the right to interpret its own rules and its applicability to Shi Yigong's application. From his own personal contacts, he learned that the committee in charge of the grants had conducted a thorough investigation after Fang Zhouzi's accusation. Both Shi Yigong and his Tsinghua University had been truthful and forthcoming on his job status throughout the investigation. The committee took votes on the issue and concluded that Shi Yigong was qualified for the grant even when his case apparently violated the rule on the letters.

The committee appeared to think that there is no need to offer any explanation for its decision either to the accuser or the public. Rao Yi disagreed. He felt the need to publish what he knew so that Shi Yigong would not be unfairly blamed for knowingly violating a rule.

Shi Yigong Becomes a Media Star in China

A few days into the new year, a media blitz unfolded in China in praise of Tsinghua Professor Shi Yigong. It involves the official Xinhua News Agency, CCTV, People's Daily, Guangming Daily, and Economics Daily, i.e., all the heavy weights under the direct control of the central government. The Economics Daily cited Shi Yigong's claim that "Returning home country to work, I feel my career has more meaning". Guangming Daily listed three personal goals from Shi Yigong himself. People's Daily priasied Shi Yigong as the model for all returning oversea Chinese scholars. The syndicated media campaign for a scientist is quite unusual. It looks like Shi Yigong is being molded into the new patriotic hero of China.

None of the media reports mentioned the controvercy of Shi Yigong's grant application and subsequet approval. With all the praise for his patriotism, they did not bother to point out that Shi Yigong is, in fact, an American citizen.

What they did mention, however, was the fact that Shi Yigong has been a recipent of the Irving Sigal Young Investigator Award, billed as "one of the most prestigous awards in biology". In reality, the award is a common one aimed for young scientists.

Shi Yigong Granted

Tshinghua University's Professor Shi Yigong has received a grant designated for outstanding young researchers with a foreign citizenship. During the public review period, Fang Zhouzi had openly questioned Shi Yigong's qualification and possibly forgery in this application. He had also sent his objections to the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation's Supervision Committee, via both email and cerfified mail. He has never received any response from the Committee. It was not clear if the Supervision Committee had ever paid any attention to the case, despite the fact that it had been well publicized in Chinese media.

Fang Zhouzi declared that he had lost all confidence with the Committee and will no longer be willing to make any further contact with the Committee.

Did Professor Shi Yigong Step Over the Line?

Professor Shi Yigong, who recently gave up a prestige position at Princeton to return to Tsinghua University, had been making a name for himself in China. Unlike the fellow returnee Professor Rao Yi, Shi Yigong tended to boast a higher personal profile. In an interview on Science Times, he claimed that his return was motivated by a strong patriotic brief. He expressed the desire to teach a new course on patriotism in Tsinghua.

Yet Professor Shi Yigong had already become an American citizen while he was in the United States. It might be quite awkward for him to teach such a course in China.

What's more, his status in Princeton was far from clear. It did not appear that he had simply given up his post as he had claimed. The Princeton University web site listed him simply as "on leave until September 2009", which means that he still maintains a position there.

There was no question that Professor Shi is working full time at Tshinghua right now. But his status at Princeton University brought up a questionable issue in his receiving a research grant from the Chinese National Natural Sceince Foundation. The grant, intended for outstanding young researchers, had a clear requirement for any applicant of non-Chinese citizenship that they should not be holding any position in a foreign institute at the time of their grant application. Professor Shi had clearly violated this rule.

Fang Zhouzi openly raised the issue to the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation, accusing Professor Shi Yigong's alleged forgery in his application. As usual, this ignited a vast controversy. Rao Yi defended his friend, claiming that it usually takes a long time for a professor to make a transition between institutions. But he could not address the issue of the grant directly. Shi Yigong chose to remain silent in public. In private, he offered to talk to Fang Zhouzi with an explanation. Fang Zhouzi declined, insisting on dicussing the issue in public.

The Making of First-Rate Universities in China

Following Rao Yi, Shi Yigong (施一公） has recent become another high-profile professor who had permanent returned to China. Shi has been the Warner-Lambert/Parke-Davis Professor of molecular biology at Princeton University and is now a Professor and Associated Dean of the College of Bioscience and medicine at Tsinghua University in China.

The two of them, Shi Yigong of Tsinghua University and Rao Yi of Peking University, just published an article in the newspaper Guangming Daily (光明日报), on the making of word first-rate universities in China. This of course has been a very hot topic in the Chinese academia. But the article of Shi and Rao does show a degree of candidness and reality that has been remarkably missing in the discussion.

For example, Shi and Rao frankly pointed out that the current universities in China has yet a long way to go before becoming first-rate: "In most cases, the academic level of the average full professor in China is lower than that of the assistant professor of a first-rate university." It is a strong verdict indeed.

To make progress in this area, Shi and Rao said that China's universities must change their management philosophy and style, adopting the international standards and creating a new system that could attract both the top researchers and the young post-docs and assistant professors from around the world.

While providing a new voice on the issue, the article, however, did not contain any concrete ideas in how to achieve such lofty goals.