At Grinnell Ma participated in Chinese students’ initiatives, such as their celebration of the founding of Republic of China in October 1923. At the benefits dinner for Grinnell-in-China in November 1922, Ma reportedly had charge of the menu alongside several other Chinese students (SB 11/15/1922). For the program that the Chinese Students’ Club put up at the local Congregational church, Ma fittingly spoke on “The Grinnell-in-China Movement” alongside K. C. Wu and Hawkins Yang (SB 10/21/1922). Ma also joined Hawkins H. Yang on the same college gospel team that went to hold a service in Gilman, Iowa (SB 11/17/1923). One might speculate that Ma and Young became so close perhaps not just because they came around the same time or shared Christian faith, but also because they did not belong to either the Nankai or the Tsing Hua cohorts on campus. A mathematics major, Ma also distinguished himself by being admitted to the competitive Mathematics Club at Grinnell, where the members were divided into two groups to compete at solving math problems each week (SB 10/25/1922).   

Ma graduated from Grinnell in January 1924, earning a bachelor’s degree in math in one year and a half (GH 01/15/1924). He then attended Columbia University and earned a master’s degree in math in 1927. In 1925 he attended a Grinnell reunion dinner in NYC in honor of Sin Chen, who attended Grinnell for one semester in Fall 1923 before transferring to Columbia, and his wife and baby daughter (SB 03/25/1925). Ma worked as a draftsman for Westchester County from 1927 until 1932 and then ran Chang’s Chinese Chow Mein Co. out of his home in Greenburgh, NY from 1932 until his death. Ma got married to Keng Ying Chuan in New York City in 1950 and died of cancer in 1957.