After receiving her BFA from Wright State University, Jan trained as a Naturalist at Glen Helen Outdoor Education Center in Yellow Springs, Ohio. Then earned a MSEd degree in Outdoor Teacher Education from Northern Illinois University. After graduation, she worked briefly at the Museum Center in Cincinnati, Ohio where she performed living history. Her next job was researching, writing, implementing, and performing educational programs for an education farm near Dayton, Ohio. She and her husband currently live in Kettering, Ohio, with their three kittie children, Robin, Feather and Kameko.