ROPE’s Right Again…Sigh. Two Muslim Schools Among 174 Registered/Registering For The Oklahoma Parental “Tax Credit”

For years, ROPE has been fighting ‘city hall’ all for a parent’s right to educate their child the way they wanted without interference from the government. Unfortunately, our advocacy for educational self-reliance appears to go out the window when money comes into the picture as we watched over 30,000 parents line up to take money from the government for their child’s education while waving the banner of “it’s my money”.

Early on in the push to get universal school choice in Oklahoma, ROPE sounded the call: 1. Once tax dollars are removed from you (by force) by a government, they are no longer YOUR dollars, they are the state’s dollars. They are not earmarked as Jane’s dollars, or Sam’s dollars – all dollars go into a pot to be divided up among government agencies and programs to be used the way the government sees fit – often, giving tax dollars away to businesses to make it desirous for them to do business in the state. 2. If the state gives private schools tax dollars, those private schools become public schools. Alex Newman, an excellent education researcher and a recent guest on our podcast explains:

LOTS of Christians have been pushing this program. “But, wait!”, we say; this will break the barrier of church and state, where the state will gain control private religious schools. It doesn’t matter, we’re told, THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS ARE FAAAIIILLLLIIINNNGGGG, and the state will stop the program once public schools don’t have enough money to educate kids anymore (because the state has stopped, Medicare and Medicaid and Welfare….insert eyeroll). “But, wait!”, we say; once the state gives out money to a Christian school, they’ll be bound to give money to ANY SCHOOL THAT DECLARES A RELIGION, including Satanists. No, we’re told, the Satanists won’t come here and the state won’t let that happen.

Lucien Greaves is the Co-Founder and the Spokesperson for the Satanic Temple.

As of 12/10/23, I counted 174 registered schools – two of which are Muslim/Islamic.

So here’s the problem. Many people in Oklahoma identify as members of the Christian faith. Unfortunately, no matter how the ‘religion of peace’ likes to bill itself, Islam is not friendly to/toward Christians. In fact, Christianity Today marked the 50 countries where Christians were most persecuted in 2021 and says this:

Islamic oppression (29 countries): This is the main source of persecution that Christians face in more than half of the watchlist countries, including 5 of the 12 where Christian face “extreme” levels: Libya (No. 4), Pakistan (No. 5), Yemen (No. 7), Iran (No. 8), and Syria (No. 12). Most of the 29 are officially Muslim nations or have Muslim majorities; however, 7 actually have Christian majorities: Nigeria (No. 9), Central African Republic (No. 35), Ethiopia (No. 36), Democratic Republic of Congo (No. 40), Cameroon (No. 42), Mozambique (No. 45), and Kenya (No. 49).

A Guardian article from 2019 on persecution of Christians in the middle east said this:

In Saudi Arabia, the report says, school textbooks “teach pupils religious hatred and intolerance towards non-Muslims, including Christians and Jews”.

The website Jihad Watch, documents what the Quran says about Christians throughout its many articles. Here is but one paragraph:

A Shafi’i manual of Islamic law endorsed by the most prestigious institution in Sunni Islam, Al-Azhar University in Cairo, says that the leader of the Muslims “makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians…until they become Muslim or else pay the non-Muslim poll tax,” and cites Qur’an 9:29 in support of this idea: “Fight those who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day and who forbid not what Allah and His messenger have forbidden-who do not practice the religion of truth, being of those who have been given the Book-until they pay the poll tax out of hand and are humbled.” (‘Umdat al-Salik o9.8)

Why should ANY taxpaying Oklahoma Christian be alright with their tax dollars funding an Islamic school in Oklahoma?

Look, I don’t care who you worship, or marry, or anything else you do, frankly – unless you commandeer the government to force me to do it too – or spend my money on it. I’m certainly willing to live and let live, but I’m not okay with the government using state funds to support a school of people whose holy book tells them to fight Christians until we are humbled and become Muslim. This. Is. Not. Okay.

Additionally, we’re told that Oklahoma Public Schools are GOING WOKE and we HAVE to get kids into private education to SAVE them from the WOKENESS. Well guess what? Christian schools are going woke too.

In this article from Capstone Report, Analysis; WOKE Comes For Christian K-12 & Homeschools, the author points to the fact that the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI) has “partner[ed] with UnifiEd to offer Christian schools resources on Diversity, Inclusion and Racial Reconciliation with focus on Multiculturalism”. From the article:

And multicultural is the goal of Dr. Strickland’s organization, according to the press release: “The majority of our resources are designed to assist leaders with the ongoing challenge of implementing a God-glorifying diversity strategy that fosters a multicultural environment.”

Interestingly, an unrecorded phone call on Tuesday, November 7th with Dave Bond of OCPA and Jennifer Carter of American Federation for Children – ostensibly to help private schools become registered as vendors for the tax credit – included OPSAC, the Oklahoma Private School Accrediting Commission which, itself does not accredit schools, but is an association of organizations that accredit Oklahoma private schools. OPSAC’s “Association” page lists ACSI – thus, ACSI accredits Oklahoma private schools.

Here’s some information from OPSAC’s webpage referencing accreditation of Oklahoma private schools:

An accrediting agency that requires schools to uphold standards comparable to State standards may apply to an agency for accreditation. These standards include, but are not limited to, consideration of the school’s goals and objectives; compliance with applicable state and federal statutes; effective governance and administration; the teaching of a balanced curriculum; implementation of personnel practices which ensure the hiring of qualified and degreed instructional leaders; and standards for student achievement.

WHAT? So, if Oklahoma accredited private schools – the ONLY ones that can register for the voucher/tax credit – have to comply with state and FEDERAL statutes (you know, like the ones that say that boys can use girls bathrooms), can someone please tell me how OKLAHOMA ACCREDITED PRIVATE SCHOOLS ARE ANY DIFFERENT THAN OKLAHOMA PUBLIC SCHOOLS?

In addition, at least one private school on those approved for enrollment, Mt. St. Mary’s, has/is suffered/suffering through a sex abuse scandal.

So, to sum up – ROPE was right yet again. We fought our own Republicans TOOTH AND NAIL against Common Core only to find that everything we warned about had come true in the states and schools that used that ploy to dumb down all kids trapped in the program. We’ve fought our own Republicans for the last two years they’ve tried to foist universal school choice on Oklahomans, yet, here we are.

What is it going to take to wake up Oklahomans to the FACT that they’re being deluded into thinking – just like with Common Core – that taking money from some Oklahomans and giving it to others so their kids can go to a private school IS A VERY BAD THING? THIS?

PS: Here’s my research on the Tax Credit Rules that contains lots of information on the concept of school choice.