As Oklahomans are still adjusting to the annual November time change, Sen. Nathan Dahm, R-Broken Arrow, has filed legislation to keep Daylight Saving Time in place year-round. Senate Bill 1103 would create Central Daylight Time (CDT) in Oklahoma, ending the practice of turning clocks back an hour in November and then setting them forward an…
Oklahoma set a record for tornadoes with 31 in October, according to Gary McManus, associate state climatologist, Oklahoma Climatological Survey. “Oklahomans are growing accustomed to Mother Nature’s October weather shenanigans following a snowstorm of up to 13 inches in 2019 and a crippling ice storm in 2020,” McManus said. “A spring severe weather motif was…
Rep. Sean Roberts, R-Hominy, criticized the Biden administration’s continued push for children as young as 5 years old to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Biden administration officials laid out plans on October 20 to ensure that close to 25,000 pediatric or primary care offices, thousands of pharmacies and hundreds of schools and rural health clinics would…
Reps. Sherrie Conley, R-Newcastle, and Wendi Stearman, R-Collinsville, with 13 of their colleagues sent a letter to Shawn Hime, executive director of the Oklahoma State School Boards Association (OSSBA), requesting that he take action to stop the National School Board Association (NSBA) from requesting federal assistance on behalf of Oklahoma and for an apology to…
Sen. Micheal Bergstrom, R-Adair, filed SB 1100, which would require male and female to be the only options on birth certificates to identify a child’s sex at birth. “I was assured by the State Department of Health a couple months ago that they had no intention of adding another sex option to birth certificates, but…
Finding innovative approaches to Oklahoma’s teacher shortage while improving teacher quality was the focus of an interim study held Monday before the House Common Education Committee. The study’s host, Rep. Rhonda Baker, R-Yukon. Baker, chairs the committee. “Oklahoma, like most of the nation, faces an acute teacher shortage,” Baker said. “I first wanted to examine…
Education officials offered differing explanations and solutions to recent student learning losses during a joint legislative interim study held amid state education funding increasing 35% in the past five years to a record $3.2 billion. Rep. Rhonda Baker, R-Yukon, the chair of the House Common Education Committee, and Sen. Adam Pugh, R-Edmond, chair of the…
On Oct. 13, Rep. Sean Roberts, R-Hominy, hosted a SARS-COV-2 presentation and roundtable with fellow legislators and other government officials. Topics included SARS-COV-2 death rates, Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) testing, masks, herd immunity, natural immunity, Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting (VAERS) data, and alternative therapeutics. “During this presentation, we had great discussions revolving around research that…
Reps. Ronny Johns, R-Ada, and John Talley, R-Stillwater, held an interim study to look at ways to increase pay for support professionals in Oklahoma’s public schools. “It is so important that we bring to the forefront how important our support staff is to our schools,” said Johns, a member of the House Common Education Committee…
State school board associations from across the nation are publicly condemning the National School Boards Association’s call for parents who object to Critical Race Theory to be investigated under anti-terrorism laws. But, so far, the Oklahoma State School Boards Association (OSSBA) is not among those criticizing the National School Boards Association. In a Sept. 29…