Mark Liang, a member of San Marino High School’s graduating class of 2015, has received a Global Grant scholarship for graduate study at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom, beginning this October.
Liang will be engaged in the masters of philosophy, health, medicine and society program beginning this October. Liang’s interests align with Rotary’s area of focus that includes disease prevention and treatment. The scholarship is valued at $31,000.
At Cambridge, Liang plans to study the ways immigrants are disproportionately affected by disease when crossing borders and geographic boundaries. He expects to work extensively with the health organizations at Cambridge and the United Kingdom, extending the work he already has been doing in the United States.
This won’t be Liang’s first “Rotary rodeo:” While at SMHS, he was a member of the Rotary Interact Club, helped build the organization’s Rose Parade float, and volunteered by selling tickets as an Eagle Scout at the San Marino Motor Classic, which is affiliated with the Rotary Club of San Marino.
Liang graduated summa cum laude from Brown University in 2019 with degrees in biology and STS (science, technology and society). He was a Fulbright Scholar to Macau, China, and is currently taking a gap year from his education while working as an analyst at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine in Pasadena. He has deferred medical school for a year to utilize this scholarship.
His host is the Cambridge Rotary Club in District 1080. It is expected that Liang will speak at various club meetings, attend the district conference and generally be a resource to Rotarians and their programs while abroad.
The Rotary Club of San Marino is his sponsor, now having 30 of its nominees for the Ambassadorial Scholarship — which is now known as the Global Grant Scholarship — accepted by Rotary International. Liang learned about the scholarship through an article in The Tribune about previous Global Grant scholar and Titan classmate Jacqueline Chen, who received her master’s degree from Oxford.
Each year, the Rotary Club of San Marino seeks to identify a global grant applicant who desires to further his or her education abroad, for a master’s or doctorate degree. It is suggested that the candidate’s coursework and extra-curricular activities align with one or more of Rotary’s areas of focus, which include peace and conflict prevention and resolution; disease prevention and treatment; water and sanitation; maternal and child health; basic education and literacy; and/or economic and community development.
Applicants are interviewed on the club and district levels, in person if possible, but remotely if necessary. For further information, contact San Marino Rotary Global Grant Chair Bill Payne at (626) 252-9505 or bill.payne10@gmail.com.
