Everything You Wanted to Know About Jeremy D. Frens (But Knew Better Than to Ask)

I was born (like most people) in Sunny Southern California (unlike most people). The first two years of my life were spent in Chino, CA. My father worked on a graduate degree while serving as associate pastor at First Chino Christian Reformed Church. My mom taught ninth grade English.

In 1972, my parents moved to Newton, NJ; my dad had been called to a church there. I didn't have much say in family matters at the time (being only two years old), so I moved to New Jersey with them. We lived in Newton (near Paterson and Newark) for about eight years.

During those eight years, my parents gave me a sister and a brother. Apparently, my parents had learned nothing from me.

When I was in fourth grade, we all moved to Madison, WI and spent four years there. During those four years, I attended Holy Cross Grade School, a Lutheran grade school, despite the fact that our family is Calvinist and proud of it.

During these four years, I took piano lessons and picked up the French Horn. (I also played the French Horn after I picked it up.) I even tried out the organ one summer. Music became an important aspect of my life.

In 1981, my parents gave me a second sister, one day after my own birthday. How special.

By the time I graduated from grade school, my dad had switched professions: church pastor to hospital chaplain. Our family moved to the Chicago area so that my father could get more training. After a year, he found a job in the area so we could stay put and did. (My parents are still in the northwest Chicago area.)

While living in the suburbs of Chicago, I went to high school at Timothy Christian High School in Elmhurst, IL. High school was, from my recollection, a necessary evil. While it wasn't the best of times, it wasn't the worst either.

Unfortunately, I gave up piano playing while in high school. I kept with the French Horn until my senior year when I decided band wasn't challenging enough. On the other hand, I discovered that I had a fairly good singing voice and could sight read pretty well, so I joined the school choir.

However, music was only a hobby, not a career. Fortunately, I found that I liked the sciences and was quite good in math. People encouraged me to become an engineer, but that just didn't sit right with me. (It's far too applicable for me.) For good or bad, I didn't listen to them and decided to go with mathematics and to check out these things called computers...

After graduating high school, I went to college at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, MI. At Calvin I felt very much at home. I loved the students and faculty and staff. School work started to become challenging, where I had to study and work for hours on assignments. It was great!

I discovered that mathematics was the right way for me to go. However, I also discovered that it was secondary: Computer Science interested me even more. So, I went with a double Computer Science and Math major.

In addition, I discovered that my core courses were quite interesting as well. I developed an interest in philosophy and theology.

I also got very much involved with music while at Calvin. For my first two years, I was in The Meistersingers (an all male singing group, if the masculine Germanic name didn't completely give this away). I was also in the Calvin Oratorio Society and the Collegium Musicum all four years of my Calvin career. The Oratorio Society sings The Messiah every December, and some other oratorio in the spring, like Bach's St. Mathew's Passion. In The Collegium Musicum, I got to work on my recorder playing and learn how to play the krumhorn. It also served to strengthen my love for Renaissance and Baroque music.

I spent the next six years working on a doctorate at Indiana University. I got a Master's Degree from IU after two years, and I took quite a few interesting courses to get it. But I had a little too much fun playing with different programs and spent a lot of time working on my teaching responsibilities. The dissertation was delayed because of that.

In 1998 (dissertation incomplete), I took a position at Northwestern College in Orange City, IA. While I was quite happy there, two years later, my alma mater Calvin College hired me as a professor.

After two years at Calvin, I finally finished my dissertation. If you're really bored, you could read it.

Pictures

Here's a picture taken way back in the early 80s. It's one of my favorites.

I'm (surprisingly) the shortest one there, standing next to my Uncle Bud; on the other side of the picture are my Grandpa and Grandma Frens. This was taken at the wedding of my Uncle Rolf and Aunt Sandy.