He spent most of his life in Catholic schools, eventually receiving his B.A. in Chemistry at the College of the Holy Cross. Following graduation, he spent a year in the Jesuit Volunteer Corps enlisted as a mental health case manager in western Montana. Dr. Van Haren originally intended to save the world as a primary care doctor when he enrolled for his M.D. at the University of Rochester, but stumbled upon oligodendrocytes and neurology during a medical student research fellowship. Since that time, he has focused his efforts on saving myelin, a more feasible and still very interesting task.