Michael Lin, Making a Difference as a National Leader

By Jennie L. Ilustre

Photos by Gino Wang

When Dr. Michael Lin, biomedical scientist and national Asian American leader, received the Roscoe R. Nix Distinguished Community Leadership Award from Montgomery County recently, typically he shifted the spotlight on others.
He acknowledged the three ladies seated in front: Daphne Kwok, Ginny Gong and his wife Ellen. He was the National President of the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA) from 1995 to 1998, when Daphne was the executive director. “During her long tenure, she elevated OCA to become one of the most prominent Asian American Organizations in the nation,” he said.
“Ginny Gong and I have worked on numerous projects since we first met,” he added. Dr. Lin credited her with the idea of starting the annual minority legislative breakfast with the African American Chamber and Hispanic Chamber, hosted by the Asian American Political Alliance (AAPA). He is a co-founder of AAPA.
He thanked his wife who has “single-handedly prepared for more than 60 gatherings for AAPA to meet with public officials during the last 15 years.”  He said he and his wife will celebrate their 50th anniversary this year.
Dr. Lin is very low-profile, saying in an interview that over the years, he has avoided “emphasizing myself in serving the community” because it is not about him.
Even in his career, he prefers his works to speak for themselves. “My research work at Rockefeller University was mentioned by my mentors, Sanford Moore and William Stein, in their Nobel Prize for Chemistry,” he said, and left it to others to elaborate. “My work at the National Institutes of Health was described by Laboratory Chief Martin Riddell in his Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology.” The Nobel Prize is one of the world’s highest and most prestigious awards.
Dr. Lin also believed in education as the best investment in life. He served as a member of the Board of Trustees at the Montgomery College for 12 years and as its chair from 2009 to 2011.
The Roscoe R. Nix Distinguished Community Leadership Award is selected by Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett. First presented in 2012, the Nix award is the county’s equivalent of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award. Among other things, Nix provided leadership in public education in Montgomery County for decades.

Future Leaders
Dr Lin is a difference-maker with a vision. Daphne Kwok said in an email interview that one has only to look around to see this.
“Michael’s commitment to the next generation of leaders was most evident in his tireless work to raise funds to expand OCA’s internship program,” she wrote.
“The hundreds of OCA interns who have benefited from Michael’s work are now candidates for public office, judges, White House staff, tenured college faculty, executive directors of AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) community organizations, public sector employees, lawyers…” she noted. “Michael Lin’s seeds are already flourishing.”
Lily Qi, Montgomery County Director of Special Projects for the County Executive, echoed Dr. Lin’s mission to involve the younger generation. “He was the one who recruited me to serve on the board of OCA-DC,” she recalled. “He also encouraged me to be more involved in organizations like Asian American Political Alliance, and now its representative to serve on the Committee for Montgomery.”
She described Dr. Lin as a thoughtful and strategic leader who looks out for the community’s best interests.
Dr. Lin has the ability “to reach out and connect many different ethnicities within the Asian community to be more visible and vocal,” she said.
“He is a rare Asian American leader who is widely respected by both the Asian community and the larger community. Along that line, he’s also non-partisan in his approach to community involvement,” she noted.
Dr. Lin also goes the extra mile, she said, “He would often pay out of his pocket just so there would be Asian representation at events and special functions.”

Achievements
Born in Xiamen, China Dr. Lin grew up in Taiwan. He came to the U.S. to pursue higher education. He received his Ph.D. degree in biochemistry from Medical College of Georgia.
During his five years of post-doctoral training at Rockefeller University in New York, his work on enzyme chemistry was cited in his mentors’ Nobel Prize lecture. He was a biomedical scientist at the National Institutes of Health for the next 35 years. Again, he was a part of the research which contributed to his mentor’s Nobel Prize.
In 2006, he retired as a Program Director whose work entailed nurturing cutting-edge research in cardiovascular field.
From 2011-2013, he chaired the successful 1882 Project, which was spearheaded by a steering committee.
The project resulted in Congressional Resolutions from both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The resolutions acknowledged the injustice of the Chinese Exclusion Laws and reaffirmed the commitment of Congress to protect the civil rights of all groups.
Dr. Lin has been a national and local leader for over two decades. He was OCA’s National Executive Director from 2006 to 2008. He served as the first Chair of the Building Campaign (2003-04). During his tenure as the National President, he expanded OCA’s scope beyond the traditional focus on civil rights advocacy. In 1996, OCA spearheaded a Voter Registration Campaign, which evolved into the APIA Vote.
Dr. Lin also served as the Chair of the Governor’s Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs in Maryland (1998–2002). He is a member of County’s Asian American Health initiative and Montgomery College Germantown Life Sciences Park Foundation.
He and his wife Ellen have two children.  Christopher is an aerospace engineer at Boeing in Seattle, Washington. Jennifer is a practicing physician in Portland, Oregon. One of their favorite things to do is spending time with their young grandsons in Seattle.

Common Goal
Dr. Lin finds civic involvement as fulfilling. “One of the best things of volunteering in the community organizations is the opportunities to meet many extraordinary people from all walks of life,” he said. “Many have become long-time friends for 10, 20 or even 30 years, because of the passion and the dream we share.”
Daphne Kwok is one of these friends. Currently, she is AARP’s Vice President for Multicultural Markets Engagement, Asian American & Pacific Islander Audience. She said the community needs more leaders of Dr. Lin’s dedication to common goals.
“His selfless dedication to righting injustice, leveling the playing field, and being the voice for people without voices is most admirable,” she pointed out. “We need to clone Michael over and over again, and then our communities will truly be THE “United States of America.”