Oklahoma Elections, State, County, City

[Bunty]

It's a sad day for education in Oklahoma.

If you thought that Oklahoma has a teacher crisis now. Just wait and see what happens if Walters is the state superintendent. And if Stitt gets re-elected with him, we will end up beyond the crisis point. An idiot and a yes man do not bode well for us. And if you think that it doesn't matter that this mess is playing out, note that we've already lost one large deal to Kansas because of our education ranking. And these two bozos are doing everything they can to force their narrow views on the state and screw us all over.

People voted yes on bonds to build nice modern new public schools costing millions, while Walters and Stitt want to entice students out of them with vouchers for private schools. It makes no sense. I don't see the appeal, especially if the private schools offer no sports, band or FFA for starters. Those people who voted for Walters voted against their best interests. I'm glad the runoff vote margin wasn't very large between Walters and his opponent. Fortunately, a much larger group of voters will have their say in November.

[mugofbeer]

People voted yes on bonds to build nice modern new public schools costing millions, while Walters and Stitt want to entice students out of them with vouchers for private schools. It makes no sense. I don't see the appeal, especially if the private schools offer no sports, band or FFA for starters. Those people who voted for Walters voted against their best interests. I'm glad the runoff vote margin wasn't very large between Walters and his opponent. Fortunately, a much larger group of voters will have their say in November.

Choice in just about anything induces competition and a higher quality product - education included.

[Rover]

Choice in just about anything induces competition and a higher quality product - education included.

Um… NO. Education isn’t a business. Serving ALL the citizens doesn’t mean serving those that can wrangle influence and impose their political agendas.

Stitt and Epic demonstrate the idea of privatizing public duties for profit encourages corruption and reduces service to large slices of our society. Funneling state tax money to private schools so privileged kids don’t have to face the real world or mix with “undesirables” is not serving all our citizens.

[TheTravellers]

Um… NO. Education isn’t a business. Serving ALL the citizens doesn’t mean serving those that can wrangle influence and impose their political agendas. ....

Exactly!!! And to expand on that, you could just substitute "government" for "education", governments exist to serve all citizens (or at least, they should).

[Bunty]

Choice in just about anything induces competition and a higher quality product - education included.

Then to better compete against private schools, you better advocate that private school students have the legal right to participate in the sports programs of public schools. There might be a few in the big cities, but I never heard of a private school sports stadium.

Also consider, unlike public schools, private schools get to choose or reject students. If students perform better in private schools, then no wonder.

[bombermwc]

Um… NO. Education isn’t a business. Serving ALL the citizens doesn’t mean serving those that can wrangle influence and impose their political agendas.

Stitt and Epic demonstrate the idea of privatizing public duties for profit encourages corruption and reduces service to large slices of our society. Funneling state tax money to private schools so privileged kids don’t have to face the real world or mix with “undesirables” is not serving all our citizens.

AMEN.

Bunty, you apparently do not understand how this works.

Any private school is welcome to compete against any public school, but to do so that means they have to join OSSAA and follow the same rules as everyone else. Plenty of schools have done this. Go check out the OSSAA average daily metric (attendance) and you can see all the private schools on the list. In OKC, most notably Bishop McGuinness http://www.ossaa.net/docs/2022-23/Cl...022-23_ADM.pdf

Now MOST private schools choose on their own NOT to do that because they do not want to follow those rules. There are groups like Heartland Athletics, Oklahoma Christian Schools Athletics Association, But it's the absolute choice of the school if they want to participate in OSSAA or go their own route. But it also means that if you want to play against everyone else, you have to follow the same rules as everyone else. In this case, this is a prime example of people like Walters wanting to have their cake and eat it too. They want to give public tax money to private schools to go make up their own rules. They can go win any number of "state championships" they want in their 6 school leagues, but it's just a farce.

[bombermwc]

I thought I'd go ahead and share some more of those names for you too.
I dont know where some of these are, but the list is far from short. So tell me again how they aren't allowed......

Bishop Kelly (Tulsa)
Bishop McGuiness (OKC)
Mount St. Mary (OKC)
Holland Hall (Tulsa)
OK Christian School (Norman)
Cascia Hall (Tulsa)
Metro Christian (Edmond i think)
Lincoln Christian (I dont know)
Victory Christian (Tulsa)
Crossings Christian (OKC)
Heritage Hall (OKC)
Community Christian (I dont know)
Christian Heritage (Del City)
Rejoice Christian (I dont know)
OK Christian Academy (i dont know)
Southwest Covenant (i dont know)
OKlahoma Bible (i dont know)
Wesleyan Chrisitan (i dont know)
Corn Bible Academy (Corn)
Victory Life Academy (i dont know)

[TheTravellers]

Then to better compete against private schools, you better advocate that private school students have the legal right to participate in the sports programs of public schools. There might be a few in the big cities, but I never heard of a private school sports stadium.....

Isn't McGuinness private? If so, they've got a sports stadium.

[PaddyShack]

Plenty of private schools have their own sports ground: Crossing Christian, Casady, Heritage Hall, etc..

[Jeepnokc]

Plenty of private schools have their own sports ground: Crossing Christian, Casady, Heritage Hall, etc..

Mount St Mary

[Jeepnokc]

AMEN.

Bunty, you apparently do not understand how this works.

Any private school is welcome to compete against any public school, but to do so that means they have to join OSSAA and follow the same rules as everyone else. Plenty of schools have done this. Go check out the OSSAA average daily metric (attendance) and you can see all the private schools on the list. In OKC, most notably Bishop McGuinness http://www.ossaa.net/docs/2022-23/Cl...022-23_ADM.pdf

Now MOST private schools choose on their own NOT to do that because they do not want to follow those rules. There are groups like Heartland Athletics, Oklahoma Christian Schools Athletics Association, But it's the absolute choice of the school if they want to participate in OSSAA or go their own route. But it also means that if you want to play against everyone else, you have to follow the same rules as everyone else. In this case, this is a prime example of people like Walters wanting to have their cake and eat it too. They want to give public tax money to private schools to go make up their own rules. They can go win any number of "state championships" they want in their 6 school leagues, but it's just a farce.

I agree with this for the most part but within the OSSA as far as playing by the same rules but there are additional rules for the private schools that penalize the small private schools for winning. My son ran cross country at The Mount. They won state in 3A when he was a freshman. Because they won state...they were moved up to 4A. They were 2nd or third the next year so they were moved up again to 5A. This is school with hardly enough kids to field a cross country team competing against school where 50-75-100 kids were coming out for cross county/track. I understand the counterpoint that these private schools can give out scholarships to excellent athletes but that sure wasn't happening at MSM. MSM had a good four years with great runners and a great coach and possibly could have won state or 2/3 all four years but simply couldn't )nor should they have been) compete against 5 A schools when they have less than 100 students in each grade.

[bombermwc]

I agree with this for the most part but within the OSSA as far as playing by the same rules but there are additional rules for the private schools that penalize the small private schools for winning. My son ran cross country at The Mount. They won state in 3A when he was a freshman. Because they won state...they were moved up to 4A. They were 2nd or third the next year so they were moved up again to 5A. This is school with hardly enough kids to field a cross country team competing against school where 50-75-100 kids were coming out for cross county/track. I understand the counterpoint that these private schools can give out scholarships to excellent athletes but that sure wasn't happening at MSM. MSM had a good four years with great runners and a great coach and possibly could have won state or 2/3 all four years but simply couldn't )nor should they have been) compete against 5 A schools when they have less than 100 students in each grade.

But that's part of the balance that the OSSAA puts on the private schools to balance the ability to recruit. Public schools that recruit for athletics get punished. Go ask Jenks if that punishment happens. I can tell you it does from direct experience in a situation where they did get in trouble with a family friend that was recruited from out of state. So it goes both ways.

There's a strong debate on if those athletic scholarships are actually beneficial to those students or if its more beneficial for the name of the private school. But if you sign up as a private school, that's part of the deal. They can always petition for a change, but i would also say that this is not a widespread situation. Lincoln Christian isn't going to win a bunch of team sports and find themselves competing against a 6A-1 school. Neither will MSM. We actually have the same exact thing that happens with the Winter Guard and Percussion groups where winners are automatically moved up a class. That's totally outside of the OSSAA and is very common in that Drum Corps International based judging system.

So my point is that, it's fair and proper.

[mugofbeer]

Then to better compete against private schools, you better advocate that private school students have the legal right to participate in the sports programs of public schools. There might be a few in the big cities, but I never heard of a private school sports stadium.

Also consider, unlike public schools, private schools get to choose or reject students. If students perform better in private schools, then no wonder.

(Answering the last few posts, not just Bunty)

I respectfully beg to differ with you. You have conveniently chosen to focus solely on "competition" in school education (which l firmly stand behind). You all know l live in famously progressive Colorado and of my moderately conservative bent but still have huge ties to OK. I fully support the Colorado system because it advocates both competition and choice.

Progressive Colorado has one of the largest school voucher programs in the country. They work not only for "private" and religios schools (which is legally mandated) but also for the many charter schools. In Colorado, ALL charter schools are part of the public school system and cannot discriminate based on the points you made. Furthermore, parents are free to send their kids to public schools other than your regular neighborhood school and even cross school district lines, as long as the schools have the capacity. This is choice and competition.

My own children's neighborhood elementary school was long known to be hostile to parental involvement in their children's education before our kids started attending. The reputation was so bad the administration was changed because choice and competition resulted in few children attending the school for several years.

So, l'm sorry but the real world shows school vouchers, choice and competition ARE valid parts of education. There is simply no way public schools should be given a monopoly on our children's education.

[HangryHippo]

Sounds like there are rules and standards? The opposite of here.

[bombermwc]

(Answering the last few posts, not just Bunty)

I respectfully beg to differ with you. You have conveniently chosen to focus solely on "competition" in school education (which l firmly stand behind). You all know l live in famously progressive Colorado and of my moderately conservative bent but still have huge ties to OK. I fully support the Colorado system because it advocates both competition and choice.

Progressive Colorado has one of the largest school voucher programs in the country. They work not only for "private" and religios schools (which is legally mandated) but also for the many charter schools. In Colorado, ALL charter schools are part of the public school system and cannot discriminate based on the points you made. Furthermore, parents are free to send their kids to public schools other than your regular neighborhood school and even cross school district lines, as long as the schools have the capacity. This is choice and competition.

My own children's neighborhood elementary school was long known to be hostile to parental involvement in their children's education before our kids started attending. The reputation was so bad the administration was changed because choice and competition resulted in few children attending the school for several years.

So, l'm sorry but the real world shows school vouchers, choice and competition ARE valid parts of education. There is simply no way public schools should be given a monopoly on our children's education.

School choice is already a thing in Oklahoma. You can now take your child across district lines if you so choose. As you said, as long as they have capacity. It used to be just between schools in the district, but that was expanded. People have not chosen to make wide use of that yet. When you make that decision to go outside of your neighborhood aligned school, you give up transportation as well. For a lot of people, that's the deal killer, but the option is there. And no, i'm not ever going to support my district paying for bussing your kid 3 districts over.

But i'm also never going to support vouchers for private schools. ESPECIALLY now that parents have the choice to go to other districts. If anything, the transfer rule has made me dig in my heels more on that point. You now have the option to take your dollars where you so choose. If you want to go private, then you should be paying for that out of your pocket. You're already going to have to provide your own transportation, so why do you need me to help you pay for it? Don't like Western Heights, well Mustang is a hop skip and a jump away. So is OKCPS. I dont need to pay for you to go to Mt St Mary's. If you want to pay for that, it's your person choice to do so out of your own pocket.

[Laramie]

NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Oct. 3, 2022

CONTACT: State Election Board PIO Misha Mohr, (405) 522-6624 mmohr@elections.ok.gov
Voter Registration Deadline Approaching for November 8 Election

(Oklahoma City) – The voter registration deadline for the November 8 General Election is quickly approaching. The deadline to register to vote or update your registration before the upcoming election is Friday, October 14. Applications must be received or postmarked by the deadline in order for voters to be eligible to participate in the November 8 election . . .

Source with links: https://www.okctalk.com/showthread.php?t=45831&page=2

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[Midtowner]

Isn't McGuinness private? If so, they've got a sports stadium.

Clement E. Prible Stadium.

And Casady, Heritage, Christian Heritage, Bishop Kelly, Holland Hall, MSM also have stadiums. Probably OCS too, but I've never been there.

[Brett]

Be sure to exorcise your rite to vote.

[ABryant]

I early voted today at oklahoma county. Everyone was friendly. Go vote. If you don't someone might know you did not. If you yo run for office later.

[Martin]

^i did the same in cleveland county. i was really impressed by the efficiency of the process that they had on site.

[April in the Plaza]

I early voted today at oklahoma county. Everyone was friendly. Go vote. If you don't someone might know you did not. If you yo run for office later.

The voter portal shows if and how (in person, early, etc.) an individual voted for every election. I believe the asterisks mean that you failed to vote.

[dheinz44]

https://www.badvoter.org/ you can also use this link to see the last time you or someone else voted

[Bunty]

Clement E. Prible Stadium.

And Casady, Heritage, Christian Heritage, Bishop Kelly, Holland Hall, MSM also have stadiums. Probably OCS too, but I've never been there.

But I doubt private schools outside the metro areas have their own stadiums and sports programs. Surely someone would advocate that private school students should have legal access to the sports programs of the public schools, if they don't already.

[HangryHippo]

Surely someone would advocate that private school students should have legal access to the sports programs of the public schools, if they don't already.

No, they shouldn’t. If you’re private, you’re private.

[Thomas Vu]

I early voted today at oklahoma county. Everyone was friendly. Go vote. If you don't someone might know you did not. If you yo run for office later.

I voted on Friday. While I thought with the line that the turnout numbers were good, I was made aware that it was more run of the mill.