EXCLUSIVE — If Ryan Walters, the Oklahoma state superintendent of public instruction, had his way, he’d get teachers unions and the federal Department of Education out of public schools.
The 38-year-old superintendent, who has spent his first nine months in office courting controversy after controversy, from approving the formation of a Catholic virtual charter school to publicly feuding with the leadership of Tulsa Public Schools, isn’t afraid to name and shame his political foes.
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In an interview with the Washington Examiner, Walters, who was elected last year to a four-year term, said that a conservative vision of education has to include eliminating the influence of teachers unions and the federal Department of Education in public schools.
“We’ve got to get interest groups like the teachers union, like the radicals at the federal Department of Education, who continue to push ideology on our kids [and] continue to use our kids like a social experiment, out [of public schools],” Walters said. “When you challenge the actors that have so held back progress, like the teachers union, the federal government, and the Biden administration in particular, you’re going to create an environment for success.”
Walters said that the main goal of a conservative education policy framework is centering it “around a family-focused vision” that “includes parents every step of the way.” This means supporting parental rights, which, among other things, requires pushing for school choice.
“The reality is parents have woken up [and] red states are going to lead on this,” Walters said. “Oklahoma, we’re the tip of the spear on this [and] we’re going to continue to be aggressive and play offense for our kids.”
Teachers unions, Walters said, view education “as a way to create Democratic voters” and that they use the education system to “promote their ideology in order to win elections.”
“We’ve allowed teachers unions to control the system for so long, they view it as a way to collect money and a way to accumulate power,” the Oklahoma superintendent said. “But then it goes even deeper than that. They view education as a way to create Democratic voters.”
He continued, “They view [education] as a way to create an ideology early on in kids. You look at the positions they’ve taken; they are absurd. Talking about radical gender theory with first and second graders, talking about telling kids that they’re racist because of the color of their skin in grade school. These are absurd positions until you see what their end goal is: Their end goal is to promote their ideology in order to win elections, in order to circumvent the entire American tradition, undermine those traditions, undermine the American society as we see it. They talk about it. They want to undermine the family. They want to undermine our faith.”
Walters is set to testify Tuesday before a House education and workforce subcommittee hearing on the influence of the Chinese Communist Party in K-12 schools following a report from the parent activist group Parents Defending Education that revealed an expansive network of funding from the Chinese government into the nation’s schools. Among those school districts that received money from China was Tulsa Public Schools.
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Walters called the Chinese government’s influence in education “a national security threat” and urged Congress to pass legislation prohibiting schools from accepting funding from foreign governments.
“We should have legislation for every state that says you don’t take money from adversarial foreign governments and create and ensure that there’s transparency around these nonprofits that are funneling communist money into our schools,” Walters said.
