'Silence!': Intense, heated moments take over OK State Supt.'s last minute meeting to address concerns

NORMAN, Okla. (KFOR)- The Oklahoma State Superintendent and the Cleveland County Republican Party jointly held a last minute meeting in Norman Thursday night to address public concerns. Right off the bat, the meeting was intense and heated.

State Supt. Ryan Walters spoke at the Norman Central Library at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday.

The room reserved for his meeting had a maximum capacity of 80 people, according to Cleveland County GOP Chair, Gary Barksdale.

Barkdale also posted "rules" for the meeting which included:

• No disruptions
• No signs
• No outbursts
• Questions will be answered as they are recognized

The threat of being removed from the meeting lingered on that rules list.

Prior to the meeting, an impromptu protest took place at Andrews Park across the street from the library. Over a dozen people showed up while others, including children staked their place outside the entrance of the library.

"Hey, hey. Ho, ho. Ryan Walters has got to go," echoed amongst protestors Thursday night.

Ashley Pennington was one of the protestors and she told KFOR she was there to express her concerns over the rhetoric Supt. Walters has been spewing out.

"I have a child that's at Norman High, and I don't appreciate the things that he's done. I'm worried about the money, the banning books, the rhetoric. My kid has experienced bullying this year, and I directly associate that with his rhetoric," said Pennington. "In one word, a joke. It's a joke. We're 49th in education, and this is not going to make anything any better."

Pennington brought up school choice, something Supt. Walters has been advocating for since before he took office.

"I'm trying to get my kid through her last years of high school in one piece, and it's just something that we've never experienced and we've been in Norman Public Schools our whole life. I mean, we've been practicing school choice within Norman for five years, maybe six. We simply fill out a form and go to the school of our choice. It's not that difficult. I don't understand," added Pennington.

She also touched on Supt. Walters' claims of pornography and indoctrination running rampant through schools.

"There's not indoctrination in schools. My kid is, you know, she's been in schools her whole life. And I have two that are older than her. It's not indoctrination. Public schools are made for everybody, for inclusion, for us all to feel welcome. First of all, feel safe. It's not about one specific religion or banning this or that. The porn in schools, that's just rhetoric," explained Pennington.

Caleb McGee, the person who organized Thursday's protest agrees with Pennington.

"I am so sick of watching these Trumpers burn out all of our institutions down. His culture war bull***t is a problem, and so is his $29 million in missing funds from education. Rural schools are the way people get out of poverty, and these rural schools are teetering. And [Supt. Walters] is there trying to make them fall all the way over. We won't stand for that. We got to impeach him. We got to get him out and we got to put serious time in education. I was there at that walkout in 2018, five years ago, when they were asking for the same things. We have to prioritize our children," stated McGee.

He too feels as if the "indoctrination" in schools is nonexistent and said with a lack of history being taught in Oklahoma classrooms "does a lot more to indoctrinate people than any kind of actual telling of history or meeting of people does."

McGee's very concerns were riddled throughout Supt. Walters' meeting on Thursday.

Before opening up the floor to questions, Supt. Walters took the mic to express what looks troublesome to him. Those same concerns of his have followed him since his campaign for the State Superintendent office.

"The expectations placed on your child need to be about academics, not indoctrination," stated Supt. Walters. "This is about academic value and appropriate levels of what's in the content of our books."

He also talked about the proposed teacher sign on bonuses, the Teacher Empowerment Program, alleged indoctrination and pornography in schools, school choice, and the importance of focusing on basic school curriculum to advance Oklahoma education from a currently low to high ranking.

Supt. Walters then opened it up to questions in which about a dozen hands shot up.

News 4 asked about the recent federal audit that pointed a finger at the misuse of funds under Walters who was then in charge of Every Kid Counts.

The programs he oversaw, known as Bridge the Gap and Stay in School were designed to help kids with learning during the pandemic.

However, the audit confirmed previous reports that millions were misused on non-education items.

The Oklahoma State Department of Education's Office previously told KFOR, "As we already know – and according to the audit – a negligent, out-of-state vendor should do the right thing and work with the federal government to recover any misused funds.”

On Thursday, Supt. Walters slightly echoed the same.

"We can get legal folks in there. We can go, 'Who does the contract say who is responsible, whose name is on this? You assume responsibility. So who's in charge of this?' That's the whole purpose in signing contracts, folks," explained Supt. Walters.

The next question News 4 asked pertained to the recently approved virtual religious charter school. We asked if the solution to the so-called indoctrination in schools was a religious charter school.

"I absolutely believe there is radical indoctrination in our schools. I've been showing the examples of it for two years now on the campaign trail, once in office. Our reading scores are up before U.S. history, Oklahoma history. I've been working with the tribes to develop more robust curriculum. We want people to be proud of our history and understand again the good and the bad, all of it. But you know what? I want [people to say I want] to move back to Oklahoma. We have got to make sure that what we're doing in our schools, the content is academically rich because we know study after study shows the more academic rich the material is that you're reading, the more not only is reading comprehension going to go up as you get into the later grades, you've already got the content, knowledge is baked in that's there," he answered. "We've got to make sure in 2023 there shouldn't be any issue for a teacher to have all of that at their fingertips. They should have the resources, they should have the professional development. We can streamline these things, we can get them there. That to me is our ticket out. You get the indoctrination materials out, you put the focus on these materials and you make sure that everybody has them in their hands and has a development room here."

In a press conference held after the meeting, News 4 asked for specific examples of indoctrination happening in the classroom today.

"We have Owasso Public Schools that said that they're going to keep 'Flamer' in the classroom. I mean, you see different situations like that, that occur where even a school district gets told that this is going on, that they're still leaving it in the classroom. We have instances in the scholastic book fairs where again and again I get calls from Superintendents to go, 'Hey, I just want to let you know these books are sent to us and we're not putting them out. We're not putting them out in front of the kids.' Our rural Superintendents are very proactive on that front. But we've got to hold vendors accountable for pushing this in the state. We've got to make sure that our schools have eliminated this entirely," stated Supt. Walters.

No other specific example was given.

"There shouldn't be a single classroom in the state that has pornography in front of our kids or shouldn't be in a single classroom in the state that has indoctrination in the form of education to our kids. I'm going to continue to work until that's all eliminated. And you have the Biden administration that's actively pushing it. They rename it every month. They call it something different to try to sneak it in our classroom. I will stay vigilant to keep that out of the classroom and continue to empower parents, teachers and kids, as I've said from day one," explained Supt. Walters.

Several teachers spoke up, saying they feel like Supt. Walters isn't doing enough.

"What are you doing to help me? You're putting me in a position where I have to decide am I going to follow what you say the law is or am I going to teach what my kids need," stated one teacher.

In the mix of those questions, a spark of heat between the audience and Barksdale emerged.

"You're not saying anything we haven't heard," one person told Supt. Walters.

"It's fine if you're truthful," said another.

"Excuse me. Decorum. You would expect better from those claiming to be teachers. Excuse me! Ma'am. Ma'am. Ma'am. Please. Silence!," shouted Barksdale.

At least two people were removed from the meeting while others were advised they would be removed if disruptions continued, including a woman who played a laughing soundtrack from her phone.

After an hour and a half of the meeting, Supt. Walters wrapped it up by thanking the crowd for coming out.

"I thought it went great. I think this is exactly what we need to be doing. And I love going around the state of Oklahoma and having conversations with Oklahomans about the future of our schools. I'm always going to be very direct. I'm always going to outline to voters and Oklahomans, hey, here's the problems: we got to get indoctrination out. We've got to get the union control out of our schools and we've got to get Joe Biden out of our state. And then we get to focus on math and reading and science and real history. And this is how our kids will flourish. We got school choice done. We're going to continue to move the ball forward and I thought that was great. A lot of good questions, a lot of good feedback. I thought it was a great meeting," Supt. Walters told KFOR.

He said he'll reflect on the conversations had at Thursday's meetings, but his stance on Oklahoma's current education system will not change.