The Daily Signal - INTERVIEW | Why Oklahoma Is Promoting School Choice, Standing Against DEI

Episode Date: May 2, 2023

Oklahoma is taking a lead on school choice programs and resisting far-left ideology in classrooms across the state.  “It is amazing how aggressive the Biden administration is with this radical agenda towards our schools,” Ryan Walters, Oklahoma's state superintendent of public instruction, says. When he came into office, Walters says he told staffers there, “We're not doing diversity, equity, and inclusion. We're not doing that here." The leftist agenda in schools has gone well beyond DEI instruction, and now the Biden administration is considering changing the definition of sex in Title IX to include gender identity and sexual orientation, opening the door wide for biological boys and men to compete in girls and women's sports and to use their restrooms and locker rooms.  “We've already submitted comment to the Biden administration and told them, 'We're suing you if you move down this road,'” Walters said.  Walters joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to explain the ways Oklahoma is fighting against the Left’s efforts to influence the next generation in the classroom and to discuss the state’s aggressive action to implement school choice programs.  Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Sinal podcast for Tuesday, May 2nd. I'm Virginia Allen. The problems in America's education system are quite frankly overwhelming. What do we do about the transgender ideology being taught to students or the promotion of critical race theory in classrooms across the nation? According to Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Ryan Walters, school choice programs bring accountability and provide parents with the resources.

resources that they need to make the best decision for their child's education. Walters joins us on the show today to explain how Oklahoma is really leading the charge on school choice programs and how he and so many in his state are working to remove radical political ideology from classrooms. Stay tuned for my conversation with Walters after this. Looking for quick conservative policy solutions to current issues from America's outpost here in Washington, sign up for Heritage's weekly newsletter, The Agenda. You'll get top conservative research, a rundown of important events happening here at Heritage that you can watch online and hot takes from our experts. Sign up at heritage.org slash agenda or at the link

in the show notes. We are joined today by the Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Ryan Walters. Ryan, thank you so much for being here today. Hey, I'm very excited to be here. Thank you for having me. Well, this is a big topic, education, discussing what exactly is happening across the country with education and specifically in your state of Oklahoma. But before we dive too far into the weeds, I want to ask you, how did you first get involved in the field of education? So for me, you know, I wanted to be a teacher going all the way back to when I was in grade

school. It was something that I had a history teacher that really inspired me. You know, we were talking in sixth grade about the Civil War and about Abraham Lincoln and about kind of how he had this kind of inner strength. And it inspired, and I kind of got obsessed with history. I wanted to learn all I could. And so I wanted to be a teacher. So I go back.

I'm a public school teacher in a rural school in Oklahoma down in McAllister, Oklahoma. And, you know, as time went on, I began to see our education system does not work for all kids. And we have a system that treats all kids as if they're the same. It is very mechanic in that it doesn't allow for individuals. to kind of find their own paths to success. I was concerned about the low expectations that I was seeing in our schools. And I saw a system that didn't reward teachers. It didn't incentivize being a great teacher. It was very socialist in so many of the concepts. And you look in every other type of industry. And they're innovating. And they're trying to put all the financial incentives for innovation. And education just wasn't. And so I went on from that to sort of nonprofit. and begin working to support parents and push for change in our education system. Then I was appointed to be the governor's education advisor. And then from that point on, I want a statewide election to be the state superintendent of Oklahoma.

And we are moving absolutely as fast as we can to get an education system. It's gone so far off track in the right direction. Yeah. Well, when we talk about that education system that has gone off track, it's really easy to talk about the problems and talk about the issues. And I sat in the studio many times and talked about some of those really large issues

facing the education system with individuals from across the country. And one of the themes, when you start talking about solutions that always comes up is that of school choice. And I know that you are an advocate for school choice. You said earlier this year

that Oklahoma must and will have the most expansive school choice program in the country. How is that process going of moving forward with school choice in your state? Right. I mean, we have to have school choice. I mean, the reality is when we talk about education,

we talk about those problems. You know, I just kind of did it at a super high level right there. But the fact that we have an education system that doesn't meet the needs of all learners, we can go through the woeful NAEP scores. We can go through the lack of having folks ready when they graduate to enter college or enter any kind of industry.

But what you see here is you see an education system that has routinely pushed against, any change. And the ultimate change, the ultimate way to empower individual kids and to really get parents involved, the school choice. And the reality is, is we have these new innovative options that can occur. You have teachers that want to think more outside the box. You have systems that can come in and look completely different if we start funding students and not systems. If we start ensuring that kids are the foundation of everything we do, that means paying for the child and allowing that child and their family to determine what their education looks like.

That has to happen. Without that, you have no incentive for excellence to occur in education, for the needs of every learner to be met. Frankly, you know, I tell us to teachers all the time, being a public school teacher myself, for teachers. You may tell you what happens when you have universal school choice all of the sudden, guess what parents really want for their kids? I've got four little ones at home. So I've got, you know, I've got a seven-year-old, five-year-old, three-year-old and a one-year-old. So I've got a seven-year-old and a five-year-old in school. You want that great teacher for your kid. School choice money following the kid also incentivizes schools to keep their great teachers because they know that's what that's what'll attract parents to their schools. It has to happen. This is one of these fundamental changes that

when we get away from the teacher's union mentality of just paying for buildings, just guarantee us we get this money every year and we turn it into actually this is going to be tied to whether the parents are happy with the education their kids are getting. It is a fundamental game-changer in education. In Oklahoma, we are pushing in a universal school choice bill for every family, everyone. I've made very clear we're not carving anybody out. I mean, just think about the absurdity of these half measures. It has to be every kid, has to be every parent has access to all of their funds and can send them to a private school, a homeschool, whatever is best for their kids. And frankly, that should always be our plum line. That should always be what we come back to. What is the best thing we can do

for kids? And there's no doubt about it. School choice is what's best for kids. Well, and I know there's so many individuals that are saying, they're listening and they're saying amen right now. But there is hesitancy, even among some Republicans for school choice programs. Oklahoma House Speaker Charles McCall, he's a Republican, but he's expressed opposition to education savings accounts and says that it could hurt rural districts. What's your response to that? You know, and our speakers come around this year and has really been championing school choice.

He's really been out in front on it. But, you know, what we've seen is the teachers union in red states plays a game where what they do is they target certain members. And they really, really put a lot of pressure on them. And again, in a red state, they go after Republicans. And so what you have is you have a dynamic where you have some rights. and you have some Republicans that are getting bankrolled by the Teachers Union, even in a red state like Oklahoma, that they feel that pressure to, well, we can do all these other

conservative things, but education is always their carve out. Well, we'll pass some of these great pro-life bills, we'll cut taxes, but education, I mean, we're getting hammered by the union, and they mobilize quickly. You know what I mean? And that's the other thing that I think can spook a lot of legislators. And that's where, you know, all your listeners need to be aware, we as conservatives have to be speaking up and demanding school choice. The unions mobilize fast. They inundate a local legislature. And even when that member of the legislature is a Republican, we have seen them get garner just enough support in red states to either kill school choice or water it down so much, like I said earlier, that they're half measures. Half measures drive me

nuts on school choice. I mean, I can't imagine. I did an interview with a with a fake news reporter not too long ago out of Tulsa and they were saying, you know, well, you're the, you're the head of our school system. Why do you keep talking about school choice and why do you talk about private school kids and charter school kids? And I go, because every kid matters. I'm not going to sit here and say, hold on a second. I only care about kids in our public school. I don't care about the kids in our private school and I go, and who talks like that? But listen to yourself. That's what you're asking me to do.

I'll never do that. I'm going to defend every kid. And if we don't have universal school choice, if we allow the unions to do these carve-outs and these half-measures, we are never going to create a system that every kid truly has every opportunity to be successful. And I think that has to be a line in the sand as conservatives we draw. Parents know best for kids. We want family involvement.

I mean, you look at that. Look at how much. We talk about that as a nation of the breakdown of the family. We should do all we can to incentivize the family to sit at that dining room table with their kids. Talk about what happened at school. Talk about what you're learning at school. Figure out ways to help. Figure out what you want your job path to be and say, well, hey, if that's what you want to do,

maybe we put you in another school. I had a farmer from Clinton, Oklahoma, grabbed me at an event I had and said, listen, I'm right there with you. You know, like my kid already is ready to enter into the industry, the family industry. You know, we're farming and we've got this new technology that we want him to learn and work with. And, yeah, you know, we're in a traditional public school that's saying you've got to go to school this many hours and do this type of subjects and it's got to look this way. And he goes, my kid can excel, but the system he's in isn't working for him. He is a talented kid.

He's going to be fantastic. But it's wearing him down. And you hear this from people of all backgrounds. And we've got to get that system in place so that every kid. kid has that opportunity. And what does the timeline look like as far as Oklahoma moving forward and passing legislation that will allow that universal school choice? This session, I mean, we've got a bill. And again, you mentioned the speaker earlier, and I've said, I mean, he's been great this session. So he's passed out of his chamber of universal school choice measure. We have a more

limited one that passed out the Senate. And we're in negotiations right now. We've got a great governor in the state of Oklahoma, Governor Kevin Stitt. He is a huge champion of school choice. And so, you know, between the Senate, the House, him and myself, we're going to keep pushing that it's got to be every kid. We've got to make sure that we're not carving folks out. And so right now, we are in the final stages of negotiating that. I have a lot of confidence that's going to get done. But for any of your listeners in Oklahoma, hey, let your legislators know, hey, we don't want carve outs. We think that every parent, we think every kid matters. We think every parent should have universal school choice in the state. And we want to be a leader. I mean, I'm passionate about ensuring that it,

as a state, we have put our kids in the position to be the most successful state in the country. And, you know, we're seeing other states doing this. I've been, you know, it's been incredible what Governor DeSantis has done, what Governor Huckabee Sanders is doing. We've seen these successes. We need, though, this as a country. And I do appreciate, you know, President Trump made this a top priority. He came in and talked about school choice. Every state should have it.

And we've really come a long way. but we've got to get the wins. And that's the other thing. As conservatives, we need to talk about it. We've got to win people over and explain to them the cause. And we've got to go get it done. So, you know, we're focused on getting this across the finish line, Oklahoma. Well, and one of the other issues that I know you're very passionate about

and that you want to see Oklahoma really leading on is pushing back against the Biden administration and its proposed rule change to Title IX. So Title IX, of course, protects equal opportunities for women and girls within. education, including in sports. Well, now the Biden administration, they want to change the definition of sex within Title IX to include sexual orientation, gender identity. You all are pushing back in Oklahoma. Talk a little bit about what you all are doing. You know, it is amazing how aggressive the Biden administration is with this radical agenda towards our schools. When I first came in office, I had my agency, I said, hey, we're not doing diversity, equity,

and inclusion. We're not doing that here, okay? And they started flagging for me. Well, we need to talk about these grants because the Biden administration keeps adding additional criteria to grants. Hey, we've gotten for years that are basic math and science. Now they're adding in these diversity equity and inclusion components. So we saw that initially. And then this radical overstep to say we are going to unilaterally here at a whim change Title IX to say that states, you're going to risk federal funding. If you don't allow boys that say they're girls to participate in girls' sports, So we passed a law in our state that said we weren't going to allow that to happen.

And so I initially, I've come out and we've already submitted comment to the Biden administration and told them, we're suing you if you moved down this road. The minute that you institute this new rule change, you will be sued by myself and by all the power that I have to say, we will not do this in Oklahoma. You will not hold our kids hostage. You will not endanger our girls by saying we want to start not allowing them to compete, but it brings up the entire question of, you will not hold our kids hostage. by saying we want to start not only allowing them to compete, but it brings up the entire question of separation between the two sexes in that capacity in athletics. And we're seeing this professionally. We've seen a UFC fighter break the skull of a female,

and it's a man that says he's a woman. And this is dangerous. This radical ideology is dangerous. It is dangerous. And my daughter, you know, my oldest already wants to be a tennis player. She takes tennis lessons. Think about if we don't act on this, our young girls, and we've seen it all over the country, that work their whole life to get to a state tournament, to have an opportunity to win us. And think about, you know, there's so many cool, I'm a former coach, I'm a basketball coach and a tennis coach.

You know, all of those cool, like lessons that you can learn from dedication, the work ethic that you get from sports. And for us as a country to come to a point where our president says, hey, you know, for you know, for. Forget all that. I mean, you know, we're more worried about the self-esteem of, you know, this boy that now says he wants to be a girl and go compete. And boom, hey, go out there and win the track estate tournament. Go out there and beat these girls in tennis or basketball or volleyball. It is, it is absurd. It is insane that we have reached a point where Joe Biden is threatening the states to force them to take boys in girls sports. And hey, we're not going to do it. We're going to sue them. We are absolutely not going to implement. We have been very direct. I've been working with some other states. We've got great superintendents of instruction in Florida, South Carolina, and other states that we talk and we're banding together. We're actually meeting later today. We are going to fight back and we are not going to give up our kids.

We're not going to give up our schools to this woke agenda of the Biden administration. And I mean, that's the reality. They want to control the schools and they want to control your kids. Yeah. I want to ask you to speak for a moment from the perspective of teachers. You were a teacher. You interact with, I know, so many teachers. And teachers are often the ones who I know are being asked to teach this woke ideology, to embrace it.

And many of them, that's not what they signed up to do. They signed up to instruct and educate kids. When you talk to our teachers, what do they say that they need? You know, that's a great question. And that is one of the things that it's funny how the fake news media, that they don't report that part of, you know, recruiting teachers. I hear from teachers all the time. We had mandatory sex ed classes that were to be taught in Tulsa Public Schools in Oklahoma,

our biggest school district that were pushed. And the teachers go, hold on, this is not your typical sex ed. This is graphic. This is way into, I don't want to do that. I came here to teach biology. I came here to teach physical science. And the teachers go, they shut down our classroom for weeks to come teach this to our kids. And they go, hey, we're leaving, okay?

Like, as soon as I can get out, I'm getting out. I'm getting out. And I hear this from teachers all over the state that say, listen, we came to teach our subject matter. We love kids. We want to help kids. We love math or English. They always tell you their stories and go, the more that you're going to push me to do things that, first of all, I don't agree with. Second of all, have nothing to do with what my core role is as a teacher. I'm going to get out. And I'm going to tell you the other thing. So they're pushing this woke ideology. You have you have administrators and the administrators get together and it's almost like the woke Olympics. They They are almost competing with each other of who can be the furthest left administrator.

So you've got that dynamic. And the other thing is with the woke ideology, they've also mixed in here, and you hear this from teachers all the time. Hey, the belief of, you know, hey, you know, when a kid acts up or misbehaves, I mean, he's a victim, you know, so you just got to let him do it. You just got to let them, you know, it's the victim mentality. It's like I said at the beginning, the lack of high expectations, both on academics and on student behavior. This comes from that left-wing ideology that, hey, we have victim groups. There always be victims. We have oppressors.

We have oppressors. So they build that into a system. And teachers go, well, what am I supposed to do when Johnny is thrown an eraser at my head saying things that I would never say? And I'm told, well, you know, just, you know, Johnny is going to yell at Johnny be Johnny. You know, we don't want to discipline. It could hurt their self-esteem. That is part of what the left, and even in red states, we have allowed the left to

push into our schools. I'm going to give you one more. You know, hey, I'm pushing for performance and merit-based pay in Oklahoma, and we're going to do it. We're launching some over the summer, some of these programs. We want it across the board where, hey, when you're a great teacher and you show that and you exhibit that, boom, you should get pay raises based on that. Guess what? Teachers union fights it every time. Hey, frankly, we have a lot of administrators that fight it. Well, how do we pick who the best teachers are? I go, we just, you name a teacher, teacher of the year in most of your districts. Hey, you're fine with a performance-based pay raise. We have some administrators that get $60,000 performance pay increases.

But yet we can't do that for our teachers. We've created a system that's socialist in nature. Hey, teachers, it doesn't matter how good you do, no matter how bad you do, it doesn't matter how engaged you are. It doesn't matter what all you're doing in your classroom. You're going to make the same amount every year. And when you do that, it goes against basic human nature.

The more we incentivize excellence, the more excellence we're going to get. And the more that we allow a union mentality in our schools, the more you're going to see the radical ideology push, and the more you're going to see no incentive for excellence, and so you're going to get less of it. Ryan, before we let you go, I want to ask you to leave us with a little bit of hope

because this can get discouraging, and we hear all of these problems and issues. So as we think about education and the path forward, what is your encouragement to parents, to teachers, and even to students listening? Oh, let me be clear. I am very hopeful. I am very hopeful because what we saw in the last two years is parents have awoken to what is going on in our schools.

Parents got to see when schools were shut down. They first of all got to see what was being taught in our schools. Second of all, they got to watch how the unions reacted. The union said, well, pay us a bunch of money and we'll open schools back up. It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, is this about safety or not? Like, you said it was about safety. Now you're basically shaking us down in order. to open up. And then next, they started pushing mandatory vaccines on kids. And so parents go,

hold on a second. These teachers unions, I mean, hey, we knew they were doing some things and fighting some things. They were literally fighting to keep my kid out of school. They are literally fighting to take away my decision on whether my child gets a vaccine or not. They are the ones that are behind this woke ideology and this woke agenda. They then saw their lining up and working with the Biden administration on these efforts. And parents go, enough is enough. We are going to get active. We don't care what the teachers' union say about us.

We don't care what the leftists say about us. We are here. We are engaged. That brings me tremendous hope in that what we've seen across, hey, when I first started teaching, that was something we talked about. Hey, you know, school board meetings are empty. You know, parent teacher conferences. You don't have as many parents as you'd like asking about the class.

Hey, I love when parents ask me about class. Hey, I want to tell you about my class. I want you to look at what's going on because, What if you are engaged in what's going on in our class, your kid's going to be more engaged. You're going to be asking them questions at home. It's a win-win for everyone. And now we have seen parents' engagement at levels we haven't seen in years. We've seen parents have identified the problem.

And parents are continuing, hey, you know, my best advocates in the state of Oklahoma are these parents. I get calls from parents, emails from parents every day going, hey, we've seen this. This is an issue here. This is an issue here. And guess what else they say? what can we do? They want to be part of the solution. Every parent does.

We have identified the problems, but we want better for our kids. Every parent I meet in the state tells me, I want better for my kids. I would love it if my kids had a better experience than I had. That's what we all want for our kids. And so because parents are so engaged right now, because our country still has those traditional conservative values, and because we have champions that are fighting for it, we are absolutely going to get this back on track.

And I think that the veil has been lifted. I think the emperor has no clothes. We see that now. We see what the unions are about. These administrators have become exposed. And I think that, you know, we see this. I'm an old history teacher, so I'll go there. But we see it in American history that we rise to the occasion.

When we're confronted with a major problem, with a major issue, Americans rise to meet that problem. and we have now identified it. It has now been, we've been made acutely aware of it, and I have no doubt we will rise to meet that occasion. Excellent. Oklahoma Superintendent Ryan Walters. Ryan, thank you for your time today. We truly appreciate it and truly appreciate the encouragement as well. Absolutely.

Thank you for having me, and thank you so much for the work you guys are doing. You guys are doing a tremendous job. Heritage is one of the best foundations in the country. You guys do tremendous work, so I'm very excited to be here, and thank you so much for all you're doing. And with that, that's going to do it for today's episode. If you are interested in learning more about the topic of school choice, we invite you to both check out the Daily Signal website, of course, and also the Heritage Foundation website where we have a lot of resources and a lot of reporting that we've done on the issue of school choice that go into depth as to why it's such a strong solution to the issues that we are facing within education today. But thanks again for joining us here on the Daily Signal podcast. And if you haven't had a chance, be sure to check out our evening show.

right here in his podcast feed where we bring you the top news of the day. Also make sure to subscribe to The Daily Signal, wherever you like to listen to podcasts, and take just a moment to leave us a five-star rating and review. Thanks again for joining us today, and we'll see you right back here at 5 p.m. per top news edition. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. Executive producers are Rob Luey and Kate Trinko. Producers are Virginia Allen and Samantha Asheras.

Sound designed by Lauren Evans, Mark Geiney, and John Pop. To learn more, please visit DailySignal.com.