Faculty and Staff
At Torrey Honors College, our faculty are world-class scholars representing a variety of disciplines. They are sought-after experts, authors of dozens of books, and masters of discussion-based teaching. They are also committed to interdisciplinary education and modeling a life of curiosity and wonder for their students. That’s why in a Torrey Honors class, you’ll likely find a systematic theologian leading a discussion on poetry, or a philosopher leading a discussion on Russian literature.
But what truly sets our faculty apart is their investment in our students. As faculty mentors, they facilitate personalized education, promote student growth and empower Torrey Honors students with the skills to excel in whatever vocation God calls them to after college.
Faculty
Paul Spears
- Director of Torrey Honors College
- Associate Professor
Paul Spears has taught in Torrey Honors College since 1998, and has been director since 2012. In his scholarly work, he investigates how educational history, philosophy and learning theories combine to construct educational praxis. Further, he also studies how philosophical and theological commitments shape the way teachers and students behave in the classroom. He has spoken around the world, from Mongolia to Washington D.C., on apologetics, theology, and educational philosophy.
Janelle Aijian
- Associate Director of Torrey Honors College
Janelle Aijian hails from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. She earned her doctoral degree in Philosophy from Baylor University, focusing on the religious epistemology of Blaise Pascal. Her current research involves the role of skepticism in the life of faith and acedia, or spiritual despondency. Her favorite texts to teach are The Brothers Karamazov, Moby Dick, The Republic and the gospel of John.
Alina Beary
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
A native of Ufa, Russia, Alina Beary is a philosopher who is interested in virtue ethics, the deadly sins tradition, and ways in which implicit biases affect our ability to develop virtue. She earned her doctorate degree from Baylor University, where her dissertation focused on Thomas Aquinas and contemporary virtue ethics. She and her husband, David, have been married for over 10 years and have twin daughters. They love good literature and enjoy camping and hiking in the national parks.
Isaac Blois
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Isaac Blois is a New Testament scholar who received his training at St. Andrews University, where he studied the intersection of Jewish theology with the Greco-Roman milieu of Paul’s early-Christian correspondents in the Roman colony of Philippi. Isaac is passionate about reading and helping others read the Bible as a whole, a love which was fostered and developed during his undergraduate years as a student in Torrey Honors College.
Sian Draycott
- Administrative Assistant, Health Center
Siân Draycott grew up in Wales and graduated from Oxford University with an MA in Theology. An MA in Classical Studies from the Open University (UK), developed her research in Greek tragedy and comedy as seen in the relationship between Euripides and Aristophanes. In addition to team leading with IFES (International Fellowship of Evangelical Students) in Portugal, Siân has experience as a high school teacher in the UK and an ESL tutor. She loves talking to people about Jesus and watching...
Joe Henderson
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Joe Henderson is a scholar of English literature and the Old Testament, uniting his love of reading well with his love of reading the Bible. His doctoral research on the poetry of the book of Jeremiah is the fruit of his interest of both the history of biblical interpretation and of literary criticism. His other interests include Robert Louis Stevenson's novels, Paul's theology, Milton's Prose, Brevard Childs' hermeneutics, Flannery O'Connor's stories, and Charles Wesley's hymns.
Matt Jenson
- Professor, Torrey Honors College
Matt Jenson is a systematic theologian specializing in theological anthropology and ecclesiology. He holds a B.A. in literature and philosophy from Wheaton College and a Ph.D. in theology from the University of St. Andrews, where he was part of the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts. Jenson is a happy and grateful part of Fountain of Life Covenant Church in Long Beach and an ordained minister in the Evangelical Covenant Church.
Adam Johnson
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Adam Johnson is a theologian who focuses on the doctrine of the atonement, exploring the many ways in which the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ effect the reconciliation of all things to God. He and his family lead the Torrey National Parks class every summer.
Jane Kim
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Jane E. Kim completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where she majored in English and French, and received her master's degree and doctorate in English literature from Cornell University, where she focused on the influence of poetic theology on British Romantic conceptions of the poet and poetry. Her current research interests include 18th and 19th-century British literature and religion and literature.
Mark Makin
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Mark Makin is a philosopher specializing in contemporary metaphysics and epistemology, with a deep appreciation for the history of philosophy. His research focuses on the nature of explanation in metaphysics and its applications. In his free time, Mark enjoys playing jazz saxophone, indulging in Jane Austen film adaptations, rooting for the New York Giants and exploring America’s national parks.
Greg Peters
- Professor, Torrey Honors College
Greg is a native Virginian who loves traveling (especially to monasteries in Europe) and reading. He enjoys the fiction of Chinua Achebe, Georges Bernanos and the nineteenth century Russian novelists; and the poetry of George Herbert, John Donne and Gerard Manley Hopkins. He is an ordained priest in the Anglican Church of North America, serving as rector at the Anglican Church of the Epiphany, La Mirada.
Fred Sanders
- Professor, Torrey Honors College
Fred Sanders is a systematic theologian who studies and teaches across the entire range of classic Christian doctrine, but with a primary focus on the doctrine of the Trinity. Fred has taught in Torrey Honors College since 1999, and is an amateur historian of Biola's institutional history. He is co-founder of the annual Los Angeles Theology Conference, and maintains an active internet presence via Twitter and blog. He and his family are members of Grace Evangelical Free Church.
Joshua Smith
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Todd Thompson
- Chair, Department of History
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Todd M. Thompson is Associate Professor of History at Torrey Honors College, Biola University. Before coming to Biola, Todd completed his Ph.D. studies at the University of Cambridge and spent four years teaching at an Arab university in the Middle East. He is interested in the global dimensions of intellectual history and his research focuses on the history of Christian-Muslim relations and the relationship between violence and religion.
Laurie Wilson
- Assistant Professor, Torrey Honors College
Laurie Wilson received her master’s degree in Greek and Latin and her doctoral degree in classics from the University of St. Andrews where she was an H.B. Earhart Foundation Fellow and a Postgraduate Fellow in the James Wilson Programme for Constitutional Studies. This background reflects her passion for classical reception studies and interdisciplinary research, which has focused on Augustine, Cicero and writings from the American founders.
Matthew Wright
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Matthew Wright is a political theorist who specializes in the Thomistic-Aristotelian natural law tradition. This entails a methodology particularly sensitive to the diverse forms of natural association and authority that fall within political communities. He is interested in understanding how groups like families and churches relate to the political community and what political life uniquely contributes to the full development of human social capacities.
Matt Van Hook
- Assistant Director of Recruitment and Marketing
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Matt Van Hook received his doctoral degree in political science from the University of Notre Dame with a focus on political theory, constitutional studies, and American political thought. He also holds a master’s degree in security studies from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif. Van Hook taught at the United States Air Force Academy for several years where he served as the American and Policy Studies Division Chair in the department of political science and a faculty...
Diane Vincent
- Associate Professor, Torrey Honors College
Diane Vincent is Associate Professor of Medieval Literature at Torrey Honors, Biola University. Her doctoral work at the University of Cambridge investigated the use of question and answer, religious language, heresy, and ars grammatica in medieval England. Her interests range widely across the liberal arts including theological anthropology, history and pedagogy of university "great books programs", Greek tragedy, Plato, dance, choral music, Shakespeare, and the Bible.
Staff
Anna Glenn
- Academic Coordinator
Anna is an alumna of Torrey Honors College and Biola University, where she graduated summa cum laude with a B.M. in Music Performance. She also holds a M.M. in Music Performance from the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music at CSU Long Beach. In her spare time she enjoys performing and listening to live music, exploring Los Angeles with her husband and snuggling her adorable daughter.
Ellie Martin
- Assistant Director of Academic Programming
Ellie is a native of the San Francisco Bay Area and an alumna of Biola University and the Torrey Honors College, receiving a B.A. in Communication Studies. She holds an M.L.A. from Johns Hopkins University where she studied the history and philosophy of higher education in the postbellum era. Her research interests include the history of education from antiquity to the present, and the value of the liberal arts in the 21st century.
Anita Axe
- Admissions and Recruitment Coordinator
Anita leads a dedicated team of Torrey Honors College student admissions advisors and oversees the application process and "Torrientation" week for hundreds of candidates annually. Prior to managing admissions at Torrey Honors College, Anita served in management, marketing, advancement, and administrative roles at British Rail and in education and non-profit sectors. Anita's commitment to process and systems management excellence in Torrey Honors is complemented by her dedication to ensuring...