A curriculum coup: Oklahoma Republicans allow right-wing rewrite of history

State Superintendent Ryan Walters bypassed oversight to push Christian Nationalism and right-wing conspiracies into public classrooms

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Public school students in Oklahoma will soon be taught that the 2020 election had major “discrepancies” (it did not) and that COVID originated in a Chinese lab (there’s no conclusive proof of that). They will not, however, learn about George Floyd's death or the Black Lives Matter movement.

That’s because, as part of his ongoing efforts to brainwash children, Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters quietly modified the (already awful) state standards for public school social studies classes before the State Board of Education voted on them, without giving them any real time to notice what he’d done. The standards were approved, and they’re now sailing through the Republican-led legislature.

Why the initial state standards for social studies were a problem

You may recall that, back in December, the draft standards made national news because they included all kinds of religious indoctrination. Walters even bragged in his press release that the new standards “mention the Bible and its historical impact over 40 times.”

The new standards are among the strongest in the country: pro- America, pro-American exceptionalism, and strengthen civics and constitutional studies across every grade. They include Supt. Walters Bible curriculum recommendations and mention the Bible and its historical impact over 40 times.

…

“Oklahoma is putting the Bible and the historical impact of Christianity back in school. We are demanding that our children learn the full and true context of our nation’s founding and of the principles that made and continue to make America great and exceptional,” said Walters. “I am proud that Oklahoma is taking the lead in putting President Trump’s education agenda into practice. We are presenting a successful model that others can emulate for how to restore public education and eradicate radical woke influences from our schools.

What were some of those lessons?

First graders would be taught the “purpose and meaning” of the Pledge of Allegiance “and the significance of the phrase ‘under God.’”

First graders would also have to explain the meaning of “In God we trust” and “the importance of religion to American people”… even though, if recent surveys are accurate, Americans have grown decidedly less religious over the past several decades.

Second graders would be taught “stories from Christianity that influenced the American colonists, Founders, and culture, including the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth (e.g., the “Golden Rule,” the Sermon on the Mount).”

That wording suggested a strain of Christian Nationalism promoted by pseudo-historian David Barton. Many of the Founders, and certainly the foundational documents of the country, were not influenced by Christianity. And the Golden Rule was not a Jesus Original™.

That same lie made its way into 8th grade classes, too, since students would have to “Evaluate the role of Judeo-Christian ideals in supporting colonial demands for independence, as exemplified by the Bible being a frequently cited authority by America's Founders.” (Spoiler: It wasn’t a frequently cited authority.)

For high school students, the indoctrination was even stronger. Christianity and slavery were only connected through Christian humanitarians who called for its abolition, not how the Bible was often used to justify enslavement.

It was no different in U.S. Government classes, where students would have to describe how the Constitution “was influenced by religion, morality, and the Bible as a frequently cited authority by America's founders.”

When it came to world history, the Bible was treated as a historical text. Students were supposed to describe how Christianity worked in ancient Rome, including “the meanings and effects of Jesus of Nazareth’s words as recorded by Matthew.”

An elective class on the “History of 20th Century Totalitarianism” offered Christianity as the alternative to Communism, laughably called on students to understand “the Christian idea of the equality of souls, the Christian ideal of charity, and the renunciation of worldly wealth.” (None of those things describe the current Republican Party that is backed by the vast majority of white evangelicals.)

The standards also asked students to summarize “the political impact of President Clinton’s impeachment”… but made no mention of Donald Trump’s two impeachments.

When the standards were that egregiously right-wing, you had to wonder who wrote them. And the answer wasn’t surprising.

[Walters] said members of that 10-person [executive review] committee would include the co-founder of the conservative nonprofit PragerU, a representative from the conservative American Enterprise Institute and the president of another conservative group, the Heritage Foundation, along with multiple other right-wing voices. Only three of the people on the executive committee have ever lived in Oklahoma.

There are no Oklahoma public-school teachers or administrators on the executive committee, although there were about 75 of them who worked on updating the standards.

And yet somehow, Walters has made these standards even worse.

Why the revised state standards for social studies are an even bigger problem

In February, the State Board of Education was supposed to vote on approving those Bible-heavy standards. They considered delaying the vote since Gov. Kevin Stitt had appointed three new members to the group, but Walters urged them to hurry it along. He was in a very big rush for some reason. He insisted it was so the legislature could get their hands on it in time… even though the Board could easily have voted a month later with no consequences.

What he didn’t tell them was that he had modified the standards to add more right-wing conspiracies while removing certain elements he didn’t want students to learn about.

Walters did not send the new standards with his additions to the members of the board until 4 p.m. the day before the board’s 9:30 a.m. meeting. This did not give members enough time to read the new standards, which are around 400 pages long. Some of the members said later that they did not even realize that the new standards were different from the earlier version that they had previously reviewed.

The changes weren’t discovered until weeks after the Board of Education voted to give the standards a green light. They were first reported by the outlet NonDoc.

What had Walters changed? Consider a U.S. History course for 9th graders.

The initial version of the standards listed a handful of things that students needed to understand from the first Trump administration: changes in foreign policy, the impact of George Floyd’s death, the response to COVID, issues related to the 2020 election (presumably including the events of January 6).

The revised version that got approved was much more specific—and much more conspiratorial. It says COVID originated in a Chinese lab, insists there were “discrepancies” in the 2020 election, falsely claims there were security risks with mail-in ballots and “sudden batch dumps,” etc.

Identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of “bellwether county” trends.

The initial version had a section on the “challenges and accomplishments” of Joe Biden’s presidency that included economic recovery after COVID and the bipartisan infrastructure bill.

The revised version only focuses on the challenges, not the accomplishments:

The initial version asked students to compare Judeo-Christian beliefs to Communism by highlighting the “Christian idea of the equality of souls, the Christian ideal of charity, and the renunciation of worldly wealth.” (Yes, that’s incredibly ironic given the current administration.)

The revised version removes that section entirely.

None of these changes were made public prior to them being voted on, and Walters didn’t mention them when he was pressuring the Board to cast their votes in favor of it.

If those standards went into effect, they would also creates a different problem for public schools: Finding textbooks that cover these topics.

[Democratic Sen. Mark] Mann pointed out that standards which deviate too far from established facts can make it hard for textbook companies to write textbooks for the state.

“When you start deviating from what is the norm and the truth and start coming up with your own truths and throwing in the Bible and election denying and all that, there’s going to come a point where Oklahoma won’t have a textbook publisher willing to align to our standards and sell a book in Oklahoma because it’s very expensive to align,” Mann said. “But when you’ve got Oklahoma, Texas — other states — and they’re redoing their standards, it’s not a huge alignment if you’re sticking to facts.”

Oklahoma Republicans refused to block these standards from taking effect

So what recourse is there now? The easiest solution would have been for the legislature to reject Walters’ ideologically driven agenda. They had the power to do that!

State law says that, “By adoption of a joint resolution, the Legislature shall approve the standards, disapprove the standards in whole or in part, amend the standards in whole or in part or disapprove the standards in whole or in part with instructions to the State Board of Education.”

If the joint resolution is vetoed by the governor and the veto hasn’t been overridden, the standards are deemed to be approved. The same would apply if the Legislature fails to adopt a joint resolution within 30 legislative days following the submission of the standards.”

But late last week, when there was a resolution to block the standards from getting approved, Oklahoma Republicans just looked the other way:

Republicans who objected to the process the standards went through filed a resolution last week to block it, but that resolution didn’t make the floor agenda on Tuesday.

"Following a lengthy conversation Monday, the caucus was not on board with rejecting the standards based on the process in which they were presented to the board of education," Sen. Pro Tem Lonnie Paxton's office told KOCO 5 in a statement. "The standards are not a legislative obligation, and the curriculum is developed by the State Department of Education."

That means the standards are automatically approved. Students will be lied to because Ryan Walters cares more about appeasing Donald Trump than preparing students for the future.

The simple fact is that college admissions counselors will now have to think twice before admitting an Oklahoma high schooler because there’s no guarantee they have the proper history background to succeed in those college-level classes.

Remember that this isn’t just one bad move by Walters. It’s the latest in a long series of them.

Walters, after all, is the guy who requested (then canceled) bids to purchase 55,000 Trump bibles for public school classrooms, then purchased 500 Trump bibles for use in Advanced Placement Government classes anyway. (Even though there’s no requirement for teachers to use the Bible in the classroom, Walters has repeatedly pushed them to do exactly that, many superintendents have rejected the idea, and there’s an ongoing lawsuit to prevent Walters’ plans from being enacted.)

But these social studies standards, now riddled with right-wing conspiracies, are just another way for him to inject Christianity where it doesn’t belong. Walters can pretend this isn’t about inflicting his religion and political views upon children, but his public statements all point in that direction. Instead of openly saying he wants to convert kids, he just claims Christianity is intertwined with American history, giving him a secular rationale for his religious goals. Instead of saying he wants to brainwash kids with Fox News lies, his office says it’s all about educating them and getting kids to “think for themselves”:

“The left has hijacked our education system. We have teachers outright teaching our kids to hate our country and our leaders. Not in Oklahoma. In teaching our standards, we believe in giving the next generation the ability to think for themselves rather than accepting radical positions on the election outcome as it is reported by the media.”

It’s a lot easier to get kids to believe lies when you refuse to ever tell them the truth.

Walters is now celebrating the fact that he tricked the state into adopting his propaganda:

Today is a major victory for Oklahoma families and for the truth. After months of Democrats and the teachers unions lying and attacking, the most unapologetically conservative, pro-America social studies standards in the nation are moving forward.

For nearly a year, we engaged in a thoughtful, transparent process to deliver standards that teach students factual history, including the realities of the 2020 election, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the threat posed by Communist China. These reforms will reset our classrooms back to educating our children without liberal indoctrination.

As part of these standards, the Bible will now be recognized as a foundational text, helping students understand its undeniable influence on our nation's history and values.

We’re proud to defend these standards, and we will continue to stand up for honest, pro-America education in every classroom.

It wasn’t transparent at all. It’s not “factual.” And it’s telling that Walters says he’s opposing “liberal indoctrination” (a.k.a. actual history) by inserting “unapologetically conservative” lies in their place.

For what it’s worth, it may be a premature victory. Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice have issued a statement condemning the new standards and they say they plan to take action:

“Oklahoma families, not politicians or public schools, should decide if, when and how children engage with religion. If implemented, these new social studies standards will violate students’ and families’ religious freedom by promoting Christianity and advancing Christian Nationalist disinformation. Not on our watch. We are preparing to take the steps necessary to protect the religious freedom of all Oklahoma public school students and prevent these standards from undermining public education in Oklahoma.”

Are they filing a lawsuit? We’ll find out soon.

Keep in mind that, by one measure, Oklahoma ranks near the bottom (49!) of the worst states in the country when it comes to education. Ryan Walters will not stop until his state ends up even lower on the list.

And Republicans in Oklahoma are apparently very eager to help him get there.

(Portions of this article were published earlier)

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