Freedom to Learn: Tiffany Hoben on Financial, Academic, & Discipline Chaos in West Virginia Public Schools
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Ricochet
4.4 • 651 Ratings
🗓️ 2 April 2026
⏱️ 34 minutes
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Freedom to Learn podcast. |
| 0:04.0 | I'm your host, Ginny Gentles. |
| 0:05.0 | This season, we're diving into what it means to return education to states, communities, and families. |
| 0:11.0 | And we're exploring what becomes possible when education is freed from union dominance and federal control. |
| 0:29.7 | Tiffany Hoban, a former teacher and administrator, joins us today to talk about the evidence of systemic failure she found when combing through West Virginia's reviews of districts and schools. |
| 0:39.1 | She found countless examples of persistent financial mismanagement, administrative dysfunction, failure to provide safe learning environments, and violations of state and federal law. |
| 0:45.5 | Tiffany is really good at explaining how school systems break down. Fortunately, she's great at proposing solutions. Listeners can find a comprehensive list in her report, special circumstance reviews |
| 0:50.2 | as diagnostic for systemic failure in West Virginia public schools. We talk about a few |
| 0:54.9 | today. And Tiffany explains why it's important to offer educational freedom through West Virginia's |
| 1:00.0 | universal education savings accounts, the Hope Scholarship. Tiffany Hoban has 20 years of experience as a teacher |
| 1:07.4 | and district and state administrator. She also served in the U.S. Army as a combat field medic with the Florida National Guard. |
| 1:13.7 | At the time of our conversation, Tiffany was the director of education partnerships and strategy |
| 1:17.7 | at the Cardinal Institute for West Virginia Policy. |
| 1:20.6 | Soon after, she shifted to a new role as the chief academic officer for the Department of War |
| 1:25.5 | or Defense, Education Activity. |
| 1:32.5 | Tiffany Hoban, welcome to Freedom to Learn. |
| 1:34.8 | Thank you for having me. It's great to be here. |
| 1:36.9 | Well, I'd like to start with your background before we dig into some recent research, |
| 1:41.8 | a report that you've issued. What drew you to teaching? You're a former |
| 1:45.8 | teacher. I went to college for psychology and got a bachelor's in psychology, and it turns out |
| 1:52.5 | there's not a lot you can do with that. So during that entire stint at college, I had been |
| 1:59.7 | substitute teaching and grown to love it. |
... |
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