Since 1966, I have been privileged to explore life with my best friend and wife, Lois. Our nightly walks and talks, cooking, baking, going to the theater, are among the activities we enjoy together. We also treasure spending time with our two children and five grandchildren.
Traveling is among our major passions. In the early years of our
marriage we
did extensive camping (our honeymoon was six weeks in a VW van
exploring the
Other countries we have been fortunate to visit include most of the
countries of Europe,
Summer 2002 presented a very special trip. My daughter Stacy
(MD soon
to be PhD) married a wonderful young man in
My doctoral studies focused on how young children learned mathematics, a far cry from computers, but a true bonus as a educator looking to appropriately integrate technology into the learning process. Both my bachelors (Cal State U, Fresno, 1966) and masters (Cal State U, LA, 1969) were in mathematics, and I was accepted into a doctoral program in mathematics when two events occurred: an opportunity to write a math textbook for teachers and my becoming a math specialist at the elementary school level. The book was published in 1975 (and second edition in 1979) and my two years in Compton working with young children convinced me that mathematics education was a more appropriate academic pursuit than pure math. The agony and joy of my first year in my doctoral program was captured in an article written back in 1973 - Year One - but seems timely to me even today. I completed my Ph.D. in Mathematics Education at UCLA in 1976.
I spent the next
couple of years teaching part-time at California State University, Los
Angeles
and several community colleges, working on the second edition of the
book, and
coming to grips with the eye-problem which had been diagnosed in
1974. I have Retinitis Pigmentosa, a degenerative eye disease
which ultimately
can leads to
complete blindness. RP is tunnel vision and night blindness,
which is my situation -- I can see only that which is exactly straight
ahead of me. It's
like
looking through a straw; I cannot see off
to the side nor toward the ground. When I was diagnosed, my
visual field was assessed
at 30
degrees (legal blindness s 20 degrees and the time you need to stop
driving). I continued to drive until 1991, when my visual field
was at 25
degrees. I didn't want to cause an accident nor hurt anyone, so
stopped. Giving up that independence was one of the hardest
things to do
given the horrible public transportation in LA. However, I was
extremely
lucky and found wonderful people who went way out of their way to
provide me
carpool opportunities.
After completing my doctorate, I had planned to teach part-time and
write
mathematics textbooks full time. However, I realized with
my eye
problem that I needed something more permanent, with greater long term
security, and a fixed commute rather than driving to several different
schools
around LA. Thus, when I found the opportunity
at UCLA, I jumped! And when I was selected, I celebrated.
Thus I begun by full-time career at UCLA in
1979.
Having spent my earning years as part of the UCLA community was a
great honor. With the ongoing innovations in computer, communication,
and
information technologies, future leaders need to be comfortable working
in
complex information intense environments. I was fortunate to be able
to
contribute to the development of information services in higher
education, and
now am very excited about working with 4th and 5th grade boys and
girls as a
volunteer Math
Olympiad coach in the hope to
see them as students at UCLA as a way of continuing my legacy.
You can reach me
via email at jason.frand@anderson.ucla.edu.