The Kingshill School

Woman spends lifetime influencing lives as a teacher

     “Ms. Janie has influenced me greatly in my education.  She’s very kind,” said Dale Donowa, an 11^th grader at the Kingshill School.

     Ms. Janie Koopmans, principal of Kingshill, has made a positive change in many students’ lives.  Being the oldest sibling in an entire family of teachers, she knew ever since childhood that education would be central to her life.

     When asked about how her career has affected her personal life Miss Janie replied, “Teaching is my personal life! There is no distinct line. Teaching is my life!”

     After getting both her BA degree with a double major in geography and elementary education,  and her masters in Special Education, she and her husband, Pas. Rod Koopmans moved to the Sultanate of Oman, located on the southeast tip of the Arabian Peninsula. Ms. Janie taught elementary school science and music in an English-speaking school while her husband helped start the first Christian churches in the area.  After living there for four years they moved back to the United States. Then, 13 years ago, they decided to make St. Croix their home.

     Miss Janie decided to take her first few months or possibly years off from teaching in order to get adjusted to her new home but only four weeks into living here a young dyslexic boy’s parents approached her for help. They had heard about her experience through the grapevine and wondered if she would home school their son so that he could attend Country Day School in the future. Miss Janie, of course, agreed to help and by the end of that school year had four more pupils who had been struggling in other St. Croix schools. Within a year, every student was able to attend and thrive at the island’s larger, more mainstream schools. This was the start of Kingshill.

     Thirteen years later, Miss Janie still pours her heart, her love and her time into the Kingshill School, a small facility that still focuses on students between 7^th and 12^th grade with learning disabilities. 

     In her lifetime this woman has helped so many students get the education they crave and deserve.  One of the pieces of advice that she shares with her students is, “You can do anything you want to do. You can do it… it takes a lot of work, but…”

     Miss Janie has put up with many things such as a desk being thrown at her once by a child with emotional difficulties, but over all, she has been able to appreciate the “tiny little rewards that reaffirmed why I became a teacher.”