A Moms for Liberty Oklahoma press release July 17 announced the organization’s reasons in supporting use of Bibles in education:

On June 27th, Oklahoma Superintendent Ryan Walters issued a memo requiring schools to incorporate the Bible in Oklahoma classroom curricula as a historical document. Since the announcement, opponents have expressed their dismay, claiming the new rule blends church and state and that the Bible has no place in Oklahoma public schools.

For years, teachers’ unions and even officials at state colleges of education have resisted efforts to improve reading instruction in Oklahoma public schools. That’s why this year’s passage of legislation focused on reading instruction is such a significant victory.

Senate Bill 362, the Strong Readers Act, requires that Oklahoma teachers be trained in “the science of reading to provide explicit and systematic instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary, encoding, writing, and comprehension and implement reading strategies that research has shown to be successful in improving reading among students with reading difficulties.”

The House today adopted Senate amendments to a bill that would require school personnel engaging in electronic or digital communication with a student to include the student’s parent or guardians. House Bill 3958, authored by Rep. Sherrie Conley, R-Newcastle, now moves to the governor. This is good news for Oklahomans raising children.

“There have been absolutely too many reports of inappropriate digital communications shared between educators and students, whether that be inappropriate pictures or texts of a sexual nature,” Conley said. “These have long-term devastating effects for young people and can ruin the lives of educators when they are wrongly accused. It’s our desire that teachers and coaches be able to share homework assignments or team communications freely with their students, but including a parent or guardian protects the students and the educators from any potential impropriety. This also keeps parents fully engaged in their child’s education.”

In a significant exposure of data “redefinition” today a V1SUT on Substack analysis begins with questions, “If someone told you your child’s school district had a 95.7% Academic Achievement rating, how would you feel? If you then learned that only 46.6% of students at the same district scored as proficient or better on state testing, would that change your view of the district’s performance?”

Understanding public data from your child’s school and district is second only to actively participating in your child’s education journey. Interpreting the available data year-to-year is complicated. In many cases, education officials have changed “public facing” reports to deflect and defuse public criticism.