Jan Lorko is the teacher and director of Suburban Cooperative Nursery School. She received her Early Childhood Education and Language Arts degree from the University of Akron, and she was awarded the Phi Theta Kappa Fraternity Honorary. She has 25 years of experience teaching preschoolers, working primarily as an early childhood daycare administrator; for two of those years she worked as an area coordinator for thirteen centers in the Cleveland and Akron areas.

Her cooperative journey began in 1989 when her oldest daughter began preschool at Suburban Co-op. She valued the diverse enrollment, as children from surrounding communities were welcomed at the preschool. In addition, she believed in Suburban’s “Education hand-in-hand” philosophy that involved the teacher, parent, and child. Seeing the benefits that a cooperative education had on all three of her children spurred her to join the Suburban Cooperative teaching team in 2000 as teacher and assistant director. In 2008 She became the director and head teacher for Suburban's program.

When she isn’t cooperatively working with preschoolers and parents, she enjoys cooking, hanging out with her family, improving her golf game, and eating her way through new restaurants in Cleveland. She is currently a supporter of her children: her youngest daughter, a college student; her son, who is pursuing a career in school counseling; and her oldest daughter, who teaches Language Arts at a school for special needs students.