Ryan Walters spent a decade teaching high school history — the Mayflower, the Constitutional Convention, Thomas Jefferson and Martin Luther King, Jr. — and noticed a throughline: For many key figures in American history, the Bible was “very much a motivating factor.”
Walters, now the Oklahoma State Superintendent, said it would be “academic malpractice” not to teach the Bible in classrooms.
“If somebody in history cites the Bible, whether you believe in the Bible or not, that’s really irrelevant,” said Walters, the son of a Christian minister. “We have to cover history accurately.”
Last week Walters ordered all Oklahoma public schools to teach the Bible, beginning this fall.
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“Public schools are not Sunday schools,” Rachel Laser, the president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, told The New York Times . “Public schools may teach about religion, but they may not preach any religion.”