Janice Weiner grew up in a politically engaged family in Coralville, Iowa, where she learned early lessons about social responsibility, labor rights, and civic engagement. She attended Iowa City West High School, spent her senior year as an AFS exchange student in Belgium, and later graduated from Princeton University and Stanford Law School. She credits her excellent public school education for her academic opportunities. She joined the U.S. State Department in 1987 and served in multiple international postings, including East Berlin during the fall of the Berlin Wall, Belgium, Turkey (where she worked on human rights issues), Poland, Canada, Mexico, Germany, and Washington, D.C., focusing on diplomacy, the politics of each country, human rights, and congressional relations. After retiring from the Foreign Service, she worked with the American Foreign Service Association and later returned to Iowa in 2015, where she remains active in local politics - she served on Iowa City City Council from 2019 until 2023 - grassroots organizing, and advocacy for equity, public health, and regaining balance in Iowa politics, while also raising her granddaughter.