Tulsa superintendent says decision to work with Ryan Walters has paid off for district

The superintendent of Oklahoma’s largest school district said Monday she made a hard decision to work with state schools Superintendent Ryan Walters – who had threatened a takeover of her district – and the results of that decision are paying off.

Tulsa Public Schools Superintendent Ebony Johnson and Walters, who’s become a divisive figure in Oklahoma education circles for using school accreditation as a weapon, shared a stage during the opening session of InspireOK, an annual teacher development conference held this year at the Cox Business Convention Center in Tulsa.

The conference has drawn attention this year because of a sea change in groups sponsoring and/or serving as vendors at the event. Missing are teachers’ unions, such as the Oklahoma Education Association, while new additions are multiple conservative political advocacy groups, including the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, Turning Point USA, and Freedom Foundation, Oklahoma Parents for Student Achievement (which has supported the legislative push for private-school tax credits).

The Tulsa World reported the Oklahoma State Department of Education, which organizes the conference and is led by Walters, spent at least $140,000 in taxpayer money on the event. The World obtained public records from the city of Tulsa’s contract manager for the convention center and reported that state Department of Education officials didn’t respond to questions about the costs or source of funding for the conference.

The World also reported public records obtained from the state Department of Education indicated the conference’s sponsors and vendors weren’t charged any fees.

Walters and the Tulsa school district mostly were at odds for the first few months of his administration, which began in January 2023. That August, the Walters-led state Board of Education approved the district’s accreditation with deficiencies and began requiring district officials to make monthly trips to board meetings in Oklahoma to provide updates on the district’s progress, a requirement that still stands.

Walters alleged issues with poor academic performance, embezzlement investigations and a lack of transparency while butting heads with the district’s former superintendent, Deborah Gist. Gist resigned just before the August board meeting, saying she hoped that action would allow the school district to avoid a state takeover.

Tulsa superintendent, Walters say they focused on building their professional relationship

So far, it has, but Walters has kept a proverbial thumb on the district. He tried to inject himself into the Tulsa school board’s selection of a new superintendent, saying it should conduct a national search. Instead, the board promoted Johnson into the role and she and Walterd appear to be working more closely together. In recent months, Walters has taken to praising efforts of the district in its work to improve student outcomes.

But before making that progress, Johnson and Walters both acknowledged they had to address their differences.

“I just made the decision that, you know, we're going to work very closely with the State Department,” Johnson said in a conversation moderated by state Board of Education member Don Burdick. “We're going to figure this out. We're going to wrestle these decisions down together.”

She said she and Walters began speaking about how their teams could work together and “asking questions about what exactly is the mark, and how are we supposed to get there? And I think just through, you know, continuous communication, meetings after meetings, showing information, getting, you know, in a room, and looking at data together, and coming up with strategies that can work, resources being given to Tulsa Public Schools in various intentional ways, we've been able to see, you know, we can see that we're heading towards what we believe is going to be some tremendous progress for our district, and we're excited.”

“This year we started off in a very intense situation and I just feel like right now we have definitely turned the corner and I can definitely foreshadow a rainbow, if you will," Johnson said.

Walters seemed to have a similar perspective of the state of his relationship with Johnson and the district.

“So one of the things we looked at is we saw Tulsa Public Schools. We saw some of the best teachers in the state,” Walters said. “We saw a community that was really supportive of the school district. We saw test scores that continue to go down in almost every category. So this was one of our key priority areas that we wanted to figure out ways that we could help them be successful."

“And I will tell you that one of the things that began to be conversations with Dr. Johnson and myself were, you know, what are the big ways that we can really move the needle?," Walters addid. "And it was so refreshing to see a leader who was very crystal clear. She said, listen, if we're going to improve test scores, if we're going to improve student learning, it's going to come from our teachers, obviously. So what is it we can do to listen to them and figure out how to help them move the needle forward?”