In June, Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters threatened teachers across the state.
He told NBC News that if public school teachers refused to “incorporate the Bible” into their lessons, he would revoke their teaching certificates.
This intimidation tactic has become commonplace for Walters, who can rescind teaching certificates through his control of the Oklahoma Board of Education.
And which he uses for ideological ends.
Since taking office as superintendent in January 2023, Walters made fighting the “woke mob” his main objective, with progressive teachers casualties in his crusade.
He rushes to revoke the teaching licenses of liberal teachers as critics say he neglects and slow-walks the process to revoke the certificates of teachers embroiled in abuse allegations.
Oklahoma state representatives and education advocates told the Daily Dot that Walters has made Board of Education meetings into a “political circus” for his own gain as public education in the state suffers. A July, a Department of Education report found that the Oklahoma State Department of Education (OSDE) faces “significant” education quality concerns in areas like personnel, funding allocation, and equipment and supplies management.
But Walters began a July 31 Board meeting with a segment on “Trump assassination and teacher expectations,” fast-tracking a “woke” teacher to a hearing officer.
After a gunman attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump in July, Alison Scott, who taught at Ardmore High School, commented on a Facebook post saying that she wished the shooter “had a better scope.”
Scott’s comment was discovered and shared widely online by Chaya Raichik, a controversial Walters ally who runs the anti-LGBTQ @LibsOfTikTok on X and whose posts have inspired bomb threats against schools.
Walters appointed Raichik to Oklahoma’s Library Media Review Board and the two fielded immense backlash after the death of Nex Benedict, a trans Oklahoma high schooler who was attacked by their peers at school and later died by suicide. Many initially attributed the attack to transphobic rhetoric from Walters and Raichik.
When Raichik tweeted about Scott on July 16, Walters responded in a matter of hours.
“This is unacceptable. [The State Department of Education] is investigating,” Walters tweeted. “We will not allow teachers to cheer on violence against @realDonaldTrump.”
Five hours later, Walters tweeted that he had “investigated it enough” and would be “taking her teaching certificate.”
“She will no longer be teaching in Oklahoma,” Walters tweeted.
To get a certificate revoked, Walters can call a Board vote at any time and send a teacher to a hearing officer.
The State Board of Education is entirely composed his of allies: All six were appointed by Gov. Kevin Stitt (R), who supports Walters’ most controversial rules.
A hearing officer then advises Walters on whether a teacher should lose their certificate—advice Walters doesn’t always follow.
At the July meeting, Walters and the Board voted to send Scott to a hearing officer. The results are pending.
When asked if Scott would be returning to teach at Ardmore High School, a spokesperson for the school directed the Daily Dot to their July press release on the situation, which stated that Scott was being investigated.
“Ardmore City Schools strongly condemns acts of physical violence and any words that seek to encourage it,” the release said. “It is the goal of the Board of Education, together with the district’s faculty and staff, to educate students in a safe environment free from violent acts and rhetoric.”
Walters’ response to Scott’s behavior is considered extreme by Oklahoma State Rep. Jacob Rosecrants (D-46). Rosecrants is a former history teacher who pivoted to politics to advocate for public school officials.
“I don’t support [what Scott said], but I also don’t support her losing her teaching license,” Rosecrants told the Daily Dot. “There’s just nothing that she’s done that rises to the level of losing your teacher’s license.”
According to Rosecrants, the way Walters handled Scott’s behavior follows a pattern for him: The minute a progressive teacher makes a misstep, he pounces at the chance to revoke their license.
Walters even called for teachers’ certificates to be revoked while campaigning for Superintendent of Public Instruction.
In 2022, an Oklahoma parent complained that former public school teacher Summer Boismier shared a QR code with students to access books banned in Oklahoma. She also called state law H.B. 1775, which banned specific race and gender concepts from being taught, “bigoted.”
Twelve days later, Walters, who was then the Secretary of Education, called for her certificate to be revoked.
As Secretary of Education, an appointed position, Walters oversaw the Department of Education. In his new elected role as superintendent, he runs it.
“In light of recent events involving Norman High School English Teacher Summer Boismier, I am asking the Oklahoma State Board of Education to revoke her teaching certificate immediately,” Walters wrote in a letter he posted on X in August 2022. “There is no place for a teacher with a liberal political agenda in the classroom.”
Walters immediately went after Boismier upon taking office, launching an investigation two days after being sworn in—even though Boismier had already resigned from her teaching position and took a new job in New York.
Boismier was sent to a hearing officer in April 2023, who advised Walters that he and the Board didn’t have standing to revoke her teaching certificate. But they plowed ahead anyway—ignoring the officer’s findings—and revoked Boismier’s certificate last month.
“She broke the law,” Walters said of Boismier, according to the Oklahoman. “When you have a teacher that breaks the law, said she broke the law, said she will continue to break the law—that can’t stand.”
Walters also attempted to revoke the license of Tyler Wrynn. Walters began investigating them at the same time he did Boismier, saying Wrynn “actively violated state law, admitted to violating state law, to indoctrinate our kids.”
Wrynn was twice flagged by right-wing operatives for their LGBTQ advocacy. In early 2022, Raichik shared a video of them expressing support for LGBTQ students.
“If your parents don’t love and accept you for who you are this Christmas, fuck them,” Wrynn said in a TikTok video posted by Raichik on X. “I’m your parents now. I’m proud of you.”
@inkh34rt #punkdad #christmas2020 #GEICOGiveHappy #FFXmasSwitch #altteacher ♬ Punk Christmas – Soulkrushers & Emmanuel Soto & Abel Bautista
Wrynn resigned from their teaching position at Owasso Public Schools after Raichik’s post and got a new role with Tulsa Public Schools.
In October 2022 when they were at Tulsa Public Schools, Wrynn told Project Veritas in an undercover video that H.B. 1775—the same law that got Boismier in trouble—would make it possible for Wrynn to have their license revoked “for being ‘too woke.’” They also admitted to infusing the race and gender concepts banned in the law into their teaching without making it obvious.
Walters said that he instructed his staff to hold Wrynn “accountable” for indoctrinating Oklahoma public school students and promised to “do everything within [his] power” to stop Wrynn two days after taking office.
The Daily Dot could not locate any current information on the status of Wrynn’s case.
OSDE did not respond to multiple inquiries about the cases or a request to interview Walters.
Walters took a different approach when responding to the case of Jeff Myers. Myers is an Oklahoma football coach who worked at Kingfisher High School. He allegedly organized a fight club among his players, beat them with a wet towel, and looked the other way when players sexually assaulted their teammates.
In 2021, two years before Walters took office as superintendent, one of Myers’ players, Mason Mecklenburg, filed a civil lawsuit against Myers and his assistant coaches in which Mecklenburg said he was physically and sexually abused and hazed under the coaches’ watch. Mecklenburg’s lawsuit triggered a criminal investigation of Myers.
Two years later, the parents of two other Kingfisher players coached by Myers submitted a writ of mandamus against Walters and the Kingfisher School District for “not doing anything to stop” the abuse at the school.
“The State Department of Education (OSDE) has been aware for nearly two years,” the petitioners said of the abuse in their writ of mandamus “Yet neither—none of those elected, appointed, or employed to keep our schools safe—have lifted a finger to eliminate this threat. That is unacceptable.”
In October 2023, Myers was charged in the criminal investigation with a felony of child neglect and put on leave by the Kingfisher School District. Two months after that, the Kingfisher School Board settled Mecklenburg’s civil lawsuit for $5 million.
Despite the lawsuit against him, Walters didn’t take action to suspend Myers’ teaching certificate until February of this year—nearly five months after Myers was charged with a felony, over a year after taking office, and almost three years after Mecklenburg first went public about the abuse.
Unlike when Walters utilized his quest against teachers like Boismier and Wrynn to fuel his campaign for superintendent, Walters didn’t call for Myers’ teaching certificate to be revoked before or after he was elected. In fact, Walters’ lawyers argue that he can’t be held accountable for issues that “preceded his term.”
On Feb. 22, Myers was referred to a hearing officer by Walters and the Board of Education. On June 27, Myers’ teaching certificate was suspended. Justin Mecklenburg, Mason Mecklenburg’s father, told the Daily Dot that he is “very hopeful that the OSDE will act appropriately and revoke [Myers’] teaching certificate” during his revocation hearing on Sept. 25.
In June, the felony charge against Myers failed to move forward in Kingfisher County Court after a judge ruled that prosecutors weren’t able to prove that Myers had committed child neglect.
Preston Bobo, an Oklahoma education advocate who is part of the anti-Walters activist group Defense of Democracy, frequently tweets about Walters’ hypocrisy on teaching certificates. Defense of Democracy has chapters nationwide and fights for more inclusive, fairer public schools.
“It took Walters over a year to pull the teaching certificate of a coach who was physically abusing students in Kingfisher, Oklahoma,” Bobo tweeted, “but he claims he will pull the teaching certificate of a teacher for exercising her First Amendment right in a way he doesn’t like in weeks.”
In an interview with the Daily Dot, Bobo said Myers is “just one example of a teacher in Oklahoma with credible allegations of abusing students who maintained his certificate for months.”
Another is a retired public school teacher who resigned last year with his teaching certificate intact.
His alleged victim, Sheena Martin, has gone public at school board meetings and on social media with allegations of grooming, molestation, and rape against him.
In January, Walters announced OSDE would be more “more aggressive” in getting sexual predators out of schools “as fast as possible,” adding that legal charges of sexual assault will no longer be necessary to remove a teacher from the classroom.
Walters made good on that promise by suspending the teaching certificates of nine teachers in March—but Oklahoma Voice reported that his administration still “faced scrutiny for not taking quicker action against educators and coaches facing abuse allegations.”
Martin, who spoke with the Daily Dot, had already reported her case in January to Awareity, an OSDE online reporting platform that is part of Walters’ comprehensive school safety initiative.
She’d also previously reported the allegations to her local Sheriff’s Office in 2022.
But, she said, she heard nothing from Walters or the OSDE after submitting her report. And it would have been hard to miss it: Martin spoke at a Board meeting in front of Walters after his announcement.
“I am here on behalf of myself and the dozens of cases like mine that you have allowed to sit and gather dust while political games are played with our lives,” she said in her speech where Walters was present, detailing the case and alleging other victims.
The Daily Dot spoke with Tod Mercer, a local attorney who confirmed he was working with others who say they also had inappropriate relationships with the same teacher when they were in high school.
Though the teacher resigned from teaching last year, Martin doesn’t understand why Walters didn’t still actively work to revoke his certificate. Walters worked for two years to revoke Summer Boismier’s certificate, long after she stopped teaching and left the state.
She felt her case and others like it were being willfully ignored.
“This is a decades-long problem that everyone in this state has ignored,” Martin told the Daily Dot.
Finally, she posted on social media that the abuse was being covered up. A day after that, Martin said an OSDE investigator contacted her.
“I assume he had also seen my Awareity report,” she said, “but no one contacted me until I made a stink about it.”
The employee interviewed Martin and the two were in contact for about a month. Then, she told the Daily Dot it was radio silence, again, from the OSDE until June, when she asked for an update on the case. That’s when Martin was told her case was transferred to a different investigator.
Again, she heard nothing for two months.
On Aug. 23, Martin said the new investigator called her with an update on the case, revealing the teacher willfully surrendered his license and did not try to contest the allegations.
She sees this newest development as “the first big step in getting full justice,” no thanks to Walters.
“They’ve known about this since at least January,” Martin said. “Literally all of this progress has occurred within the last two weeks.”
While she has been stymied, Walters has been embroiled in a fight over exactly how to force Oklahoma teachers to incorporate the Bible into their curriculum. He is being sued by an Oklahoma parent who believes his Bible mandate violates the First Amendment and eight school districts stated that they will not be teaching the text using Walters’ guidelines.
In response, Walters turned to his favorite tactic: threatening Oklahoma teachers.
“They will comply,” Walters said of teachers who refuse to teach the Bible. “I will hold every individual accountable who tries to defy this direct order.”
Internet culture is chaotic—but we’ll break it down for you in one daily email. Sign up for the Daily Dot’s web_crawlr newsletter here. You’ll get the best (and worst) of the internet straight into your inbox.
