Jason Hoffman, longtime CFO and COO of the Jefferson City School District, has spent 15 fulfilling years in the district.

His motivation, he said, comes from the 9,000 students at JC Schools and his goal of doing what’s best for them.

“I am a strong supporter of public education,” he said. “This is our best chance to reach children who may not have what I had when I was a child and to raise them and lead them to a better life.”

Hoffman is retiring from JC Schools at the end of this school year. Looking back on his career, he said he will remember people the most and miss them the most.

“I have worked with a large group of people so I will miss those relationships,” he said.

Hoffman oversees the district budget, payroll, accounts payable, and audits. It also manages operating services, including food services, transportation, human resources and facilities.

His favorite part, he said, is creating the budget.

“I really am a geek,” he said. “Budgeting is fun for me because it’s a giant puzzle, so working with numbers and making it all work is always my favorite part.”

Hoffman has always loved numbers. When he was in high school, he planned to go to pharmacy school – but after taking an AP chemistry class, he decided it wasn’t for him.

He worked nights in high school and college at a small bank in Jackson, where he grew up and majored in finance at Southeast Missouri State University. He found himself in school finance after opening an Edward Jones office and realizing that his long-held aspiration to become a stockbroker was really just a big sales job.

He came across a newspaper ad for a job as a school finance consultant in the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education – and although he had no idea what a school finance consultant was, he decided to apply and was offered the job.

During the year he was there, he worked with 120 school districts with their reports on state finances. From there he worked for the St. James School District for three years, then in Hallsville and Centralia for another three years until the JC Schools position opened in 2006.

He was considering a job at Columbia opening at the same time, but JC Schools offered him the job first. Fifteen years later, he is happy to have accepted the position because it suits him perfectly.

Hoffman, who retires from JC Schools at an early age and likes to stay busy, will begin another full-time position at PMA, a Chicago-area-based financial services company that recently formed an investment fund in the Missouri for schools to invest their excess funds.

“I’m delighted to be able to keep my contacts around state and education, and to stay in education for a bit but just in a different role,” he said.

His new job will have more flexible hours, so he is excited to spend more time with his two sons and watch their activities, like his eldest son’s golf tournaments.

Some of Hoffman’s accomplishments as CFO and operations manager include building the Pioneer Trail Elementary School, nearly $ 20 million in renovations to seven buildings between 2010 and 2015, including the addition of secure lobbies in district-wide buildings, expansion of full-time kindergarten and the addition of a district pre-K program, and construction of Capital City High School and school renovation secondary Jefferson City and the Nichols Career Center.

But his proudest achievement, he said, is playing a role in reopening schools and keeping them open this year during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although it was difficult, he is proud that the district has succeeded in keeping the buildings open, as many other school districts have not been able to.

“Our team did a great job over the summer putting together a great plan and then our teachers and staff did an amazing job executing it,” he said.

During his tenure with JC Schools, Hoffman also served as chairman of the board of directors of the Missouri Association of State Business Officers and a member of the board of directors of PSRS / PEERS. In 2010, Hoffman received the Official of the Year award from the Missouri Association of State Business Officers School Business Officers, and in 2019 he received the Distinguished Eagle Award from the Association of School Business Officials International.