For the first time in 626 days, Oklahoma public education is not being held hostage by a small-town evangelical grifter stooge and his posse of Texas hustlers.
Not wanting to waste any time helping people forget how instrumental he was in the rise of Ryan Walters’s political career, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt appointed a seemingly normal, not-crazy man as state schools superintendent yesterday afternoon.
This normal man’s name is Lindel Fields.
Although he has about 15 months to prove us wrong, he looks to be a sane, respectable human, and not an ideological firebrand hellbent on sabotaging public education from the inside and using taxpayer dollars to wage endless culture war battles and campaigns, bankroll his own publicity stunts, and enrich his handlers, grifters, and psychotic allies.
In fact, his stated goal is to steady the ship that, until a few days ago, was being steered directly towards an iceberg:
Oklahoma's new state schools superintendent says he aims to "steady the ship" of the state's K-12 education system after the tumultuous Ryan Walters era.
Gov. Kevin Stitt announced Thursday, Oct. 2, that he would appoint former CareerTech administrator Lindel Fields as the state's top schools official and make a host of other sweeping changes involving Oklahoma education. Fields' appointment comes two days after the resignation of Walters, the far-right Republican firebrand who generated national attention for his conservative schools agenda.
Fields said Thursday during a news conference at Eisenhower International School that he would adopt a guiding mantra as state superintendent: "If you're not taking care of the students, take care of someone who is."
Yep, that’s right. Instead of vowing war and retribution against trans students, teachers unions, and federal grants, this guy wants to focus on helping students and teachers. That’s weird. I thought the role of a superintendent was to get good jobs for his buddies from Texas, stock classrooms with Trump Bibles, and email porn to lawmakers. Did Stitt appoint this guy by mistake?
If you’re incredibly bored, you can watch the video from Fields’s press conference below.
It was touching to see how humbled and polite Fields was in accepting the position, and how happy everyone was not to be around Ryan:
Seriously, isn’t that cool? I haven’t seen a group of people that relieved to not be around an Oklahoman since Rylee was evicted on Big Brother!
In addition to announcing Fields as the new superintendent, Stitt also announced he’s formed some bureaucratic committee to “fix” all the damage that Ryan – a guy Stitt groomed and nurtured into becoming the right-wing grifter psychopath he is today – did to the state.
Stitt also announced a seven-person "turnaround team" of veteran education leaders to assist Fields in that effort. Among them are Nellie Tayloe Sanders, who is stepping down as the state's education secretary, and Megan Oftedal, who's leaving her post as executive director of the state Office of Educational Quality and Accountability.
Filling Sanders' former role as education secretary will be University of Oklahoma professor Dan Hamlin, while Connie Riley will serve as OEQA executive director.
Joining Sanders, Oftedal, Hamlin and Riley on the "turnaround team" for the Oklahoma State Department of Education will be current Broken Arrow Public Schools spokeswoman Tara Thompson, Tulsa Public Schools chief financial officer Kristin Stephens and Tom Newell, Stitt's chief of staff. The roles each will play on the team remain to be determined.
Although Fields comes across as sane and normal, the one scary thing about him is that with his appointment, the creation of “turnaround teams” and the addition of new Stitt-loyal board members, the governor now has extraordinary control over our state’s education system until the next guy comes in.
Seeing how terrible of a job Stitt has done as Governor, and all the grifts and mismanagement that have occurred at agencies under his control, it doesn’t exactly instill confidence in how things are going to go. It makes you wonder that instead of filming SUV selfies decrying teacher unions and liberal Marxists, Fields is going to whine about Native American students getting free Oklahoma education, or claim the entire Oklahoma public schools system for Jesus Christ.
Basically, instead of steering the ship away from the iceberg, he keeps us heading towards it.
Stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.
