Whites no longer majority in Oklahoma City, Tulsa urban schools
The Associated Press
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Published: January 12, 2009
Poverty and a growing population of minority students, including non-English speaking Hispanics, are presenting major challenges to public schools in Oklahoma City and Tulsa, a state school official said Monday.
Sandy Garrett, state superintendent of public instruction, released the statistics during a meeting of the Senate Budget Subcommittee on Education. The chairman of the panel is Sen. Jim Halligan, R-Stillwater, a first-term senator and former president of Oklahoma State University.
Garrett said whites now make up only 22 percent of the student population in Oklahoma City. Hispanics are the biggest minority at 40 percent, followed by blacks at 30 percent, American Indians at 5 percent and Asians at 3 percent.
In Tulsa, whites total 34 percent of the school district population, the same as blacks, with Hispanics at 20 percent, Indians at 11 percent and Asians at 1 percent.
More than 80 percent of students in both districts qualify for free or reduced lunches because of their families' low income levels.
Statewide, whites make up 57 percent of the population of all of the 534 school districts, a big drop since 1990, when the white population was 74 percent.
Garrett and Higher Education Chancellor Glen Johnson appeared before the budget panel to present performance reviews of their systems. The committee is conducting a series of meetings in preparation for the Feb. 2 beginning of the Oklahoma Legislature.
The state school chief again stressed her preference for expanding the school year and the school day to improve the education of Oklahoma students.
She said excessive testing to meet state and federal mandates is leaving little time for teachers to teach, suggesting that some testing chores in some subjects could be handled at the local level.
Garrett advocated adding five days to Oklahoma's 175-day school calendar a year ago, but the proposal never became law because of budget restraints.
Sen. Clark Jolley, R-Edmond, suggested that adding 30 minutes to the school day may be something that could be done in a tight budget year, but said steps should be taken to make sure the extra time is not wasted on areas that do not improve students' education.
Johnson presented the committee figures showing administrative costs had declined as a percentage of the higher education budget, while more students were graduating from colleges and universities.
Sen. John Ford, R-Bartlesville, said he continues to get complaints about the growing cost of college education in the state.
Senators asked Johnson to provide the committee with figures on the rise in student costs from 2000 to 2008, the average administrative cost per student for that time period and the increase in salaries of college administrators.
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