Anti-Democratic and Unconstitutional: No on Senate Bill-36, Oklahoma’s Shucked School Chaplain Bill
Working with young people in a school setting is a serious responsibility. For that reason, the state of Oklahoma has long insisted that those serving professional roles in our public schools - whether as teachers, librarians, school psychologists, or school counselors - go through a rigorous certification process to ensure they are qualified to serve effectively in their jobs.
For school counselors, standard certification requirements include a master’s degree in a school counseling program and a passing score on the Oklahoma subject area test in school counseling, as well as a background check and a university recommendation. Alternative certification as a school counselor is available without a master’s degree in school counseling, but still requires a graduate degree and at least two years of counseling-related work experience along with completing of two college credit courses in components of a school counseling program, plus a background check and a passing score on the Oklahoma subject area test in school counseling.
All this careful insistence that school counselors be well-trained and qualified in their field would go out the window should the legislature give final approval to SB 36. Originally a bill related to access to police surveillance records, the bill was shucked of its original content in the House General Government committee in early April by chair Kevin West and replaced with entirely new and unrelated language. The new bill would allow school districts to employ or accept as volunteers religious chaplains “to provide support, services and programs for students”, roles currently served by school counselors. The bill expressly exempts school chaplains from state certification requirements; the only restriction on who could serve as a chaplain is that they cannot have been convicted or charged with a crime that would require them to be registered as a sex offender. The revised bill passed out of House committee and is now eligible for consideration by the full House; if SB 36 passes the House, it would return to the Senate, which could accept the House bill or send it to a conference committee.
The bill in its current form would throw open the doors to just about anyone to enter our schools. Although there are programs that offer training and certification in the role of chaplains, such as the U.S. Army Institute for Religious Leadership, there is no requirement in SB 36 that a chaplain be trained, licensed, or certified as such by any entity. There is not even a requirement that the person be an ordained or authorized pastor or member of the clergy. As a result, it’s not clear what would prevent anyone from simply designating themself as a chaplain and then taking on that role in a school.
But even in cases where an individual has formal chaplain training and experience, including a license or certificate, this doesn’t mean that they are equipped to assume the roles and responsibilities of a trusted adult in school. This concern is well expressed in a letter to state legislators written and signed by over 200 chaplains from across the nation strongly opposing the kind of legislation being considered in Oklahoma:
We care about student mental health and safety concerns, and we believe those concerns should be addressed by the professionals most skilled to meet those concerns. As trained chaplains, we are not qualified to address the needs of public school students that these proposals purport to address. We cooperate with mental health counselors – we do not compete with them. Further, professions that help children with sensitive matters, such as therapists and police investigators, typically require special training on how to interview and treat juveniles. Few chaplains have this expertise (emphasis added).
The fact that counseling students requires particular skills and knowledge is why Oklahoma insists that our counselors take courses, complete degrees, and pass content-specific tests before they are permitted to practice in a school setting. A letter issued by several dozen Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and interdenominational faith organizations emphasizes this point:
Chaplains… are trained as religious leaders to provide religious services and
spiritual care. They do not have the same academic and professional credentials as school counselors and other support staff. Relying on any untrained and uncertified individual to serve students could lead to real harm to students, and schools could be held liable (emphasis added).
Along with the decision to waive any evidence of training and experience in a school setting for chaplains, the bill’s failure to require even a standard background check to identify those with criminal histories other than as a sex offender - those who have been convicted, for example, of bribery, forgery, robbery, kidnapping, or drug trafficking - also raises alarms about who might be invited into our schools to provide counseling services to children. Earlier versions of school chaplain legislation, such as HB 3122 and SB 1984, at least included a requirement that school chaplains complete a national criminal history record check.
SB 36 also suffers from several other flaws. One serious one is the entanglement that the bill would create between public schools and religious instructors. Section II of Oklahoma’s Constitution expressly states that: “No public money or property shall ever be appropriated, applied, donated, or used, directly or indirectly, for the use, benefit, or support of any sect, church, denomination, or system of religion, or for the use, benefit, or support of any priest, preacher, minister, or other religious teacher or dignitary, or sectarian institution as such” (emphasis added). A chaplain is by definition a member of the clergy whose role is to provide religious or spiritual guidance. While defenders of the legislation deny that chaplains would try to proselytize their religious views, nothing in the legislation prevents them from doing so. When similar legislation was introduced in Texas in 2023, an amendment was offered to establish a standard of conduct for chaplains that included refraining from proselytizing the chaplain’s values and beliefs on a student; however, the amendment failed and was excluded from the final legislation enacted by the Legislature.
The proposed Texas standard of conduct for school chaplains would also have required them to “respect the cultural, ethnic, gender, racial, and religious diversity of students and other public school employees.” Oklahoma’s legislation includes no comparable provision. Schools could end up employing chaplains whose religious views are expressly in conflict with the religious identities or sexual orientation of certain students or their families, and who could refuse to serve them in a supportive manner. As the letter from dozens of faith organizations opposing school chaplain legislation points out, students who are wary of receiving counseling from religious clergy might forego seeking services altogether.
Oklahoma legislators introduced several parental consent bills this session aimed at ensuring that students are not exposed to controversial materials without their express approval. However, nothing in SB 36 would require that parents consent to their children receiving counseling services from unaccredited religious chaplains, although Rep. West indicated in committee that he would be open to a parental opt-in provision.
Supporters of the legislation point to the mental health crisis affecting youth and the shortage of professional school mental health counselors as justification for allowing religious chaplains to serve in schools. With schools facing chronically tight budgets, the option of outsourcing counseling services to unpaid volunteers may seem appealing. But waiving licensing, testing, and background check requirements to allow individuals with highly uncertain qualifications to serve in schools is unquestionably the wrong solution to a real problem. The Legislature must instead develop and fund a serious plan that ensures that all public school students get the support they need from the real mental health counselors best qualified to provide it.
