Oklahoma Voice reporter Nuria Martinez-Keel spoke to KOSU News Director Robby Korth about this story. You can hear their conversation above.
Well before he canceled and skipped meetings with the state's top school board in recent weeks, state Superintendent Ryan Walters has been chronically absent from multiple state boards where he holds a seat, including one he's supposed to lead.
Public meeting records show poor attendance from Walters, particularly this year, on various governing boards whose votes impact K-12 school funding, vocational learning centers, higher education and other state government matters.
This year, Walters has attended only one meeting of the state Board of Career and Technology Education despite being its chair, Oklahoma Voice found through an analysis of meeting minutes. He skipped the CareerTech board's six other meetings in 2025, including three that took place in a room adjacent to his office at the Oklahoma State Department of Education.
Oklahoma CareerTech Director Brent Haken, a non-voting member of the board, has led the meetings in Walters' place. In 2024, Walters attended six meetings and missed four, and in 2023, he attended seven and was absent for four, meeting minutes show.
Haken said Walters' presence, or lack thereof, has had no impact on the board and the CareerTech agency, which oversee vocational education centers across the state.
"Actually I enjoy the lack of attention so that we can get work done for the state of Oklahoma," he said.
Walters also leads the Oklahoma State Board of Education, whose meetings have become a circus of protests, political conflict and media attention during his tenure in office.
After a month of heightened tensions with board members, Walters abruptly canceled the board's regular Aug. 28 meeting with little explanation. It was the board's second canceled meeting of 2025, the first happening after the Education Department posted an agenda too late to comply with the Oklahoma Open Meeting Act.
The August meeting cancellation prompted the board to take the extraordinary action of scheduling its own special meeting on Wednesday.
Walters did not attend. In his absence, the present board members voted to hire an attorney and started the process to find a new board secretary.
In a statement through a spokesperson, Walters declined to explain why he missed so many meetings of his various state boards. He also did not answer whether expects future state Board of Education meetings to convene as scheduled or whether he might miss more.
"My focus has been, and will continue to be, on reforming Oklahoma's education system to put families and students first," he said in the statement. "We've implemented bold reforms across the state to raise academic outcomes, empower parents, and ensure taxpayer dollars are being used wisely in the classroom."
Wednesday was far from the only state board meeting this year where Walters was marked absent.
He hasn't shown up for a single board meeting in 2025 for the Commissioners of the Land Office, a board that oversees state-owned school lands and assets that benefit public education funding.
Gov. Kevin Stitt, Lt. Gov. Matt Pinnell, State Auditor and Inspector Cindy Byrd and Agriculture Secretary Blayne Arthur also sit on the board and regularly attend its meetings at the state Capitol, records show.
Walters also skipped the only two meetings the state Board of Equalization has held this year in February and June, according to the State Auditor and Inspector's Office, which keeps the board's meeting records. The board meets four times a year to review or certify tax revenue that funds all of state government.
Walters has missed four of the board's meetings since he took office in January 2023, according to the board minutes.
Meeting records show Walters' predecessor, former state Superintendent Joy Hofmeister, was a regular attendee of CareerTech, Commissioners of the Land Office and state Board of Equalization meetings in 2022, a year she was running for governor while in her final year of statewide office.
Hofmeister also frequently attended the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority's meetings until 2022, when she appeared only once.
Walters attended no OETA meetings in 2023 and 2024, records indicate. Meeting minutes from 2025 aren't available on OETA's website, and a request for them wasn't immediately returned.
He's never shown up for a meeting of his assigned higher education board, either.
Under state law, whoever is elected state superintendent automatically has a seat on the board of regents for the Regional University System of Oklahoma. The RUSO regents govern six public universities, the largest being the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond.
Public records show Walters has never been marked present for a RUSO board meeting since he took office.
Hofmeister didn't attend any RUSO meetings in 2022, either, but she attended one to two meetings each year over the three years prior, according to meeting minutes.
Chris Van Denhende served on the RUSO board from 2021 until February, when the governor appointed him to the state Board of Education.
He said Walters' absence had no effect on the university system's board or operations. A state superintendent's attendance, though, could have given the regents an opportunity to question why so few Oklahoma high school students graduate ready for college-level academics.
"I find the bigger story is why our elected officials take so little interest in their responsibility," Van Denhende said. "That said, we may be better off if they don't attend at all. I'm so frustrated with the politics that go on."
Van Denhende and three other Board of Education members leaned on Oklahoma City constitutional attorney Bob Burke and various state government officials to schedule and carry out their special meeting Wednesday.
Burke, a historian and former state commerce secretary, said he hopes Walters will make a concerted effort to attend all future state Board of Education meetings.
It's important that he shows up for his other state boards too, Burke said, or that he chooses a designee to attend in his place, as state law allows.
Walters has chosen a designee for only two boards, the Statewide Charter School Board and the State Textbook Committee. His proxies on both boards have maintained regular attendance, meeting minutes show.
The multitude of boards that keep state government running are often made up of mostly unelected appointees.
That's why it matters that elected officials show up, Burke said. If they don't, the voters of Oklahoma don't have their chosen representative present.
The state Board of Education is a prime example. Of its seven members, Walters is the only one whose name appears on a voting ballot. The governor appoints the rest.
"What the people lose is the vision of the (state) founders in holding all of our government accountable to the people," Burke said.
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