Van grew up in the Rockies, attended grad school to study Qing dynastic Chinese history in New England, then moved to the West Coast to teach at Whittier College. After four years in the Los Angeles basin, he moved with his family to Iowa. He now bikes to work, crossing the Mississippi to teach in Illinois at Augustana College. Van has a deep appreciation for the transforming effect of education, especially in the context of small liberal arts colleges, and was the executive director of ASIANetwork, a consortium of over 160 small colleges committed to strengthening the study of Asia on their campuses.