OKLAHOMA CITY — Oklahoma’s top school board on Thursday proposed removing a requirement that new teachers pass a written version of the U.S. Naturalization Test to become fully certified, potentially undoing another of former state Superintendent Ryan Walters’ policies.
The Oklahoma State Board of Education and the state Legislature implemented the requirement last year, but since then, Walters has resigned from office and the board has had a complete turnover of its members.
State Superintendent Lindel Fields, who succeeded Walters, and the board voted unanimously to submit a bundle of new administrative rules, including the proposal to strike the testing requirement, to the Legislature for consideration in its 2026 session.
The Oklahoma State Department of Education received four written public comments that favored eliminating the testing rule, said Kory Kile, an agency attorney overseeing the rulemaking process.
Broken Arrow Public Schools communications chief Tara Thompson, who also acts as a spokesperson for Fields’ administration, said districts have complained the test adds an extra hurdle to teacher recruitment.
“It’s just one more barrier,” Thompson said after the state board meeting Thursday. “So, anything that the state Board of Education can do to remove barriers to onboarding and recruiting good teachers, I think we saw today that they’re willing to do that and have those conversations.”
Fields’ other proposed rules would encode laws the Legislature already passed or would make small changes to administrative processes.
Walters, on the other hand, sought to make sweeping policy changes through administrative rulemaking. His failed proposal to collect public school students’ immigration status put him at odds with Gov. Kevin Stitt, who overhauled the state Board of Education with new appointees in response.
Lawmakers rejected Walters’ immigration policy, but they partially approved his rule introducing the U.S. Naturalization Test to teacher certification. Rather than requiring the American civics test for all public school teachers, the Legislature agreed to mandate it only for educators earning their certification for the first time.
Fields already has reversed several of his predecessor’s priority policies. He pledged to rewrite Walters’ controversial academic standards for social studies and rescinded an order that public schools keep a Bible in every classroom.
Removing the naturalization test from the certification process is “a move in the right direction,” Thompson said.
Oklahoma Voice is an affiliate of States Newsroom, a nation 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and donations focused on delivering state government news. The Voice maintains full editorial independence. For more stories by Oklahoma Voice go to oklahomavoice.com.
