Controversial academic standards for social studies are unenforceable because Oklahoma’s top school board violated state open meeting laws when approving them, the state Supreme Court decided Tuesday.
Five of the Court’s nine justices decided to permanently nullify the social studies standards, which had sought to require public schools to teach Bible stories and highly questioned claims about the 2020 presidential election and COVID-19. The standards were already on hold because of a temporary stay from the Court in September.
Members of the Oklahoma State Board of Education and the public didn’t receive adequate notice from a meeting agenda that the board’s Feb. 27 vote would involve standards that were “fundamentally different” from an earlier draft, according to the opinion written by Justice James E. Edmondson. This violated the Oklahoma Open Meeting Act, the Court decided.
Half of the state board members who voted on the standards later said they were unaware at the time of the vote that new content had been added to the final version. The board members received meeting materials only 17 hours in advance, which the Court deemed another violation of state law.
Neither State Superintendent Ryan Walters, who led the standards’ development, nor any Oklahoma State Department of Education staff acknowledged during the Feb. 27 meeting they had added new content. Walters’ administration didn’t publicly post the updated version of the standards until weeks after the board vote.
Among the last-minute changes were the inclusion of language casting doubt on the integrity of the 2020 presidential election and a disputed claim that COVID-19 originated in a Chinese lab.
The fact that the state Legislature permitted the social studies standards to take effect despite the controversy doesn’t cure the Open Meeting Act violation, the Court decided.
Social studies standards approved in 2019 will remain in effect while the state Education Department develops a new version, under the Court’s order.
New state Superintendent Lindel Fields already has announced his administration intends to rewrite the social studies standards. Fields was appointed to finish Walters’ term after the former state superintendent resigned early from office to lead a conservative nonprofit.
Fields’ administration did not immediately return a request for comment on the ruling Tuesday evening.
The Supreme Court made its decision in response to a lawsuit filed on behalf of 33 Oklahoma plaintiffs. The Court declined to rule on the plaintiffs’ claims that the standards would violate students’ constitutional religious freedoms and the Administrative Procedures Act.
The plaintiffs include parents, teachers and faith leaders living in the state. Attorneys from the national organization Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the local Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice are representing them.
“This is a victory for transparency, fairness, and the constitutional rights of all Oklahomans,” Oklahoma Appleseed legal director Brent Rowland said in a statement. “The authority to govern comes with accountability for making decisions in the full view of the people the government serves. Public school classrooms may not be used to endorse religious doctrine — no matter what the religion is or how many people follow it.”
Justices James R. Winchester, Douglas L. Combs, Noma Gurich and Richard Darby concurred with Edmondson’s opinion.
Chief Justice Dustin P. Rowe and Justice M. John Kane dissented. It should require fact finding by a trial court, not a ruling from the Supreme Court, to determine whether a willful violation of the Open Meeting Act took place, they contended.
Vice Chief Justice Dana Kuehn and Justice Travis Jett recused.
Two judges from the Oklahoma Court of Civil Appeals, Thomas E. Prince and Timothy Downing, also wrote separate dissenting opinions.
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