Jim and Nancy McLaren

Jim McLaren, erstwhile California beach boy, got his degree in biology from Stanford, then defied Horace Greeley by coming East for a graduate degree from Harvard. Nancy, a Connecticut Yankee, earned her B.A. in English at Smith College and also went on to Harvard for grad school.

Cupid brought them together at Newton South High School when they were beginning teachers. As young radicals of the sixties, they blazed trails in Newton by being the first couple allowed to keep jobs in the same school after marrying! However, they had to spend their first year of wedded bliss “on probation.”

Jim has written two best selling biology text books, and Nancy’s “Art of Loving Well” is a widely acclaimed relationship education program for teenagers. And, of particular interest to Shoalers, the McLarens were also the acclaimed Speakers at LOAS II in 2001!