Ashton Marra
Ashton Marra covers the Capitol for West Virginia Public Radio and can be heard weekdays on West Virginia Morning, the station’s daily radio news program. Ashton can also be heard Sunday evenings as she brings you state headlines during NPR’s weekend edition of All Things Considered. She joined the news team in October of 2012.
During the legislative session, Ashton focuses on the state Senate, bringing daily reports from the inner-workings of the state’s upper house on West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s nightly television show The Legislature Today.
Ashton comes to WVPBS from ABC News’ morning program Good Morning America where she worked as a production associate. Ashton produced pieces for the broadcast, including the first identified victim of the Aurora, CO, movie theater shooting and the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, as well as multiple entertainment news stories.
Before her time at GMA, Ashton worked as an intern on ABC’s news assignment desk, helping to organize coverage of major news stories like the Trayvon Martin case, the Jerry Sandusky trail, tornadoes that ravaged the South and Midwest and the 2012 Presidential election. She also spent 18 months as a weekend reporter for WDTV based in her hometown of Clarksburg, WV, breaking the story of missing Lewis County toddler Aliayah Lunsford. Ashton’s work from that story was feature on HLN’s Nancy Grace in October of 2011.
Ashton graduated summa cum laude from West Virginia University in May of 2012, where she was named WVU’s Reporter of the Year. She covered government for the P.I. Reed School of Journalism’s bi-weekly newscast WVU News and also served a semester as the WVPBS bureau reporter.
When she isn’t reporting, Ashton enjoys cooking and is an avid supporter of the arts, including theater, music and dance. She is a huge fan of musicals and touts her collection of Playbills from the Broadway musicals she’s attended, which grew by nearly 30 in her 9 months living in New York City.
-
The University of Akron says it's anticipating a $16 million operating deficit for the new fiscal year beginning July 1st. The university attributes the... -
The debate over Ohio’s school report cards continues in Columbus this week as state Board of Education members consider a recommendation to make even more… -
Mandi and Harris Jaffe were both on the campus of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14 when a former student started firing.Mandi, a… -
The Zelma Watson George Community Center sits in the Woodland Hills neighborhood of Cleveland. After school, a group of teenagers plays a game of three on… -
While Ohio could be the home of a national championship basketball team, with the Cavs competing in their first game of the 2018 NBA Finals Thursday night, the state unfortunately won’t be the home of this year’s national spelling champion. “Popliteal” and “mydriasis” were the two words that took down Ohio’s final participants in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington Thursday. -
A new Stanford University analysis of state and national test scores shows more Ohio students pass state exams than similar nationwide tests, which… -
State Board of Education members will vote this week on whether to ask for a delay in the implementation of the final phase of the state’s A-F grading… -
The Ohio Board of Education will consider a resolution this week delaying a major piece of the state’s school report cards. State Board of Education... -
At least one Ohio school impacted by the abrupt bankruptcy of Discovery Tours will still be able to take their field trip, thanks to the help of their local community, but the travel company’s closure is affecting students across the state. The Columbus Board of Education voted Friday to accept more than $20,000 in donations from local education groups, firefighters, police officers and others for students at Ridgeview Middle School. -
Now that the field of candidates vying to be the next governor of Ohio has been narrowed to two, voters could soon get a better sense of the path the...
