Special Report
MEDIC
CONNECTIONS / ON HE COVE
Michigan's newest medical school
and a hospital in Israel's Central Galilee
make plans to grow together.
Don Cohen
Special to the Jewish News
srael and Metro Detroit drew just a lit-
tle bit closer on Feb. 15 as representa-
tives from the new Oakland University
William Beaumont School of Medicine
(OUWB) and Israel's Emek Medical
Center announced that a Memorandum of
Understanding had been signed between
the two institutions.
The Memorandum states the "sincere
intention to establish mutually beneficial
academic, research and commercial col-
laboration between our respective institu-
tions."
Through a series of coincidences and
connections made by Detroiters, Israelis
and the OUWB founding dean's personal
and professional relationships in Israel,
the time from inspiration to implementa-
tion of the agreement took less than a year.
The story starts with Dr. Robert Folberg,
who was hired by Rochester-based
Oakland University in fall 2008 to head its
new medical school. He is also a tenured
professor of biomedical sciences, pathology
and ophthalmology and Royal Oak-based
Beaumont Hospitals' chief academic officer.
Folberg has built an international repu-
tation in the field of ophthalmic pathology,
hospital administration, education and
research.
A native Philadelphian, Folberg, 60,
has a deep connection to Judaism and
Israel, where he has traveled and lectured
since the 1980s. He speaks fluent Hebrew.
His brother, Steven, is the senior rabbi at
Congregation Beth Israel, a Reform con-
gregation in Austin, Texas.
"The Detroit community has been very
inviting and very welcoming:' Folberg
said. "Being involved in the Jewish com-
munity is very, very important for us, and
we've been active everywhere we've lived!'
Folberg and his wife, Amy, bought
a home in Birmingham and joined
Congregation Adat Shalom in Farmington
Hills, where she enjoys reading Torah.
Their daughter, Abigail, remained in
Chicago, where Folberg was chairman of
the pathology department at University of
Illinois Hospital in Chicago for eight years
before coming here. Their son, Ephraim,
is in his first year at Case Western Reserve
University School of Law in Cleveland.
Connections Spread
Folberg already brings a lot to the table
regarding the Israel connection, but
now the Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Detroit enters the
picture.
The Federation has been
connected with Israel's Central
Galilee though Partnership
2000 for more than a decade.
During that time, there have
been all kinds of exchanges
between Michigan and the
region, including Emek Medical
Center in Mina, the principal
medical facility in the region.
In fall 2009, the Federation
brought a delegation from the
region to Detroit and invited
Folberg to meet with them. In
both English and Hebrew, he
spoke with the participants
who asked him if he was
familiar with Emek. He admit-
ted that in all his trips to Israel,
he had only driven past it, but never visited.
When the delegation returned to Israel,
e-mail flew back and forth that eventu-
ally connected him to Larry Rich, a native
Detroiter who had moved to Israel in 1972
and is Emek's director of development,
international patients and public relations.
Dr. Robert Folberg, founding dean of
Oakland University William
Beaumont School of Medicine,
lectured in Israel last May at
Emek Medical Center during
northern Israel's first ophthalmic
pathology symposium.
A Heartbeat Away on page 12
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