Teacher Profiles

K3-Brenda Kornacki
K4-Danita Stich
K5-Mary Pat Russell
K5-Michelle Kornburger
Grade 1-Kathy Thomas
Grade 1-Kristin Becker
Grade 2-Danielle Herzog
Grade 2-Ann Grunwaldt
Grade 3-Jennifer Bass
Grade 3-Megan Lilly
Grade 4-Donna McCormack
Grade 4-Melanie Polaski
Grade 5-Maureen Koplien
Grade 5-Elizabeth Platz
Grade 6-Sara Daggett
Grade 6-Jan MacDonald
Grade 7-Mary Goll
Grade 8-Donna LaFlamme
Grade 8-Kris Seifert
Music-Christine White
Art-Sheila Barker
Art-Cynthia Lorenz
Spanish-Lori Miller
Phy Ed- Dwayne Wunschel
Librarian-Patti Simmons
Computers-Joyce Sauer
Reading-Gordonna Komassa
Band-Joan Lueneburg
Strings-Maria Gesiorek
Counselor-Wendy Weinfurter

 

Maureen Koplien

maureen.koplien@stdominic.net

5thGrade

Ext. 256

Teaching at St. Dominic School since: 2006 (Graduate of St. Dominic School)

Teaching/Experience since :  2002 - substitute teaching

Degrees and Advanced Training: Bachelor of Science, plus 6 graduate credits

Statement of Philosophy:

 
I believe that as a teacher I need to provide a safe and exciting learning environment for my students. Each student should feel comfortable giving an opinion or asking a question in my classroom. I help students learn to be responsible for their behaviors. The sooner students learn to accept responsibility for their actions, the sooner they will become responsible students and citizens. Most importantly, I feel it is important to teach students to believe in themselves. As they become comfortable with their own opinions and beliefs, they will become more willing to respect others beliefs.

SEEK Christ April 2009 Article
Coming Home

For Maureen Koplien, past and present converge every day. A member of
St. Dominic’s graduating class of 1981, she returned to the school in 2006 to teach fifth grade.

“I have always felt at home in Catholic schools,” Maureen says. “There’s a special feeling you get when your share your faith with the people you spend so much time with.” She found, however, that the intervening years had brought changes. Maureen’s class was the last to graduate from the “old church,” now transformed into the gym. In her student days, gym class had been held in the lowest level of the building, currently the cafeteria. “Obviously there was no basketball or volleyball, we didn’t even have a gym teacher. Our classroom teachers taught ‘gym class’ which was usually some type of relay races,” Maureen recalls. What was once the art room had been converted to a high tech computer lab, while the classrooms were now outfitted with TVs and SMART boards.

Still, much remained the same. “Parental involvement is still very much a part of the quality of education and quality of students at St. Dominic. The feeling of community at Mass is as important as it was when I went to school here,” Maureen says, noting that many of her former classmates’ children now attend this school.

Some of these children have been students in her fifth grade classroom, participating in activities such as the “Dear Maggie” mailbox, where students can anonymously leave letters asking questions or voicing concerns. Maureen does not answer the letters herself, instead taking them to “Maggie” for solutions which are then shared with the class. “I think that I have an advantage relating to this age group because my own children [daughters Courtney, Amanda, and Katie] are around this age level,” Maureen says.
“I know what TV shows they watch, what music they listen to, and what games they play.”

In addition to her classroom responsibilities, Maureen further serves her parish as faculty advisor to the student newspaper Knights’ News. For the past five years, she has coached volleyball at St. Dominic beginning as an assistant and progressing to head coach. Recently she added coaching
8th grade volleyball at Asa Clark Middle School in Pewaukee to her commitments, as well as participation in a three credit course offered this year to teachers at St. Dominic School.

Maureen’s St. Dominic roots run deep. Her parents, Bob and Mary Donohue, joined the parish in 1977, and she and her husband Craig were married here in 1991. “I hope my students will still be coming to St. Dominic 20 years from now, and seeing their old classmates,” Maureen says. “I recently helped organize a reunion of the Class of '81, and had a wonderful time remembering our great times at St. Dominic.”

 

 

 
 
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