The Oklahoma State Superintendent’s office has opened investigations into two school districts after multiple high schools were caught holding appalling toe-licking events to raise money for charity.
Last week, FOX25 posted a video online showing ninth through twelfth grade students at Deer Creek High School in Edmond, Oklahoma, kissing and sucking on feet during a school event called “Clash of the Classes.” Edmond is a suburb to the north of Oklahoma City.
🚨GRAPHIC WARNING- Video sent to FOX 25 shows students at Deer Creek High kissing and sucking on feet yesterday. @DCAntlers confirms the video, saying the students volunteered in challenges to help raise money for their annual philanthropy week. More at 9pm tonight on @OKCFOX. pic.twitter.com/3FaG8BbeAE
— Wendy Suares📺 (@wsuares) March 1, 2024
In response to the viral video, State Superintendent Ryan Walters wrote on X: “This is disgusting. We are cleaning up this filth in Oklahoma schools. He added:Â “Our agency is investigating.”
He told Fox News that the investigation would focus on adults and administrative staff who authorized the stomach-churning toe-sucking event.
Toe licking will not be allowed in Oklahoma schools pic.twitter.com/w6mZzInRqk
— Superintendent Ryan Walters (@RyanWaltersSupt) March 5, 2024
In a statement to families, students and staff on Saturday, the Deer Creek School District acknowledged that the school’s toe-sucking fundraiser “failed to uphold the dignity of our students and the proud image of our community.”
However, the statement stressed that “much of the information accompanying this video is inaccurate,” and that the “students who participated in the game in question” deserved support for raising $152,830.38 for a “meaningful organization.” The beneficiary, Not Your Average Joe Coffee, employs people with intellectual, developmental, and physical disabilities.
On Wednesday, after being tipped by multiple viewers, FOX25 reported there were more videos of similar toe-sucking events in the Edmond Public School district.
The videos, found on the YouTube channels of both Edmond North and Edmond Memorial High Schools between 2015 and 2020, feature “footage of Edmond students licking chocolate, peanut butter and other condiments off feet and armpits during their week-long philanthropy events,” Fox25 reported.
UNBELIEVABLE. @EdmondSchools has been holding feet licking and armpit licking events for years where students lick chocolate and peanut butter off of staff.
After video surfaced last week of another school in Oklahoma holding a feet licking event, these videos were uncovered.… pic.twitter.com/o7JF7Kaggi
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) March 6, 2024
Edmond Public Schools issued an unapologetic statement to Fox25:
We are proud of our students for the tireless work and immense effort they put into each of our philanthropy weeks. Already this school year, our North and Santa Fe students have raised more than $416,000 for local non-profits with Swine Week at Memorial still to come. EPS school administrators, just like our surrounding districts, work with student council sponsors to make these weeks as impactful as possible. Through their efforts over many months, metro area high school students learn countless life lessons on how to make a positive difference in their community.
Walters responded to the travesty in a video posted on social media.
“We’re now seeing another disgusting video coming out of an Oklahoma public school,” Walters said incredulously. “We have Edmond Public Schools that allowed students to lick each other’s feet,” the state superintendent said. “This is incredibly inappropriate. It does not align with Oklahoma values.”
Walters vowed to “put an end” to the gross activities and said the Edmond Public School District was under investigation for putting students “in disgusting, degrading positions.”
“We’re going to get to the bottom of what adults allowed this, what adults okayed this and make sure this is not happening in Oklahoma public schools,” he said.
Toe sucking in Oklahoma schools is unacceptable. We will not allow this. Our agency has launched an investigation. https://t.co/5e9jC27F0A pic.twitter.com/PVI8xWW0Bm
— Superintendent Ryan Walters (@RyanWaltersSupt) March 7, 2024
Both schools have recently butt heads with Oklahoma’s conservative state superintendent over school library books.
On February 20, the Edmonds School District petitioned the Oklahoma Supreme Court to determine if Walters’ office has the authority to lower a school district’s accreditation if the school refuses to pull certain library books based on “subjective opinions of high school library books.”
The petition came after the Oklahoma State Department of Education (OSDE) ordered Edmond Public Schools to remove what it deemed age-inappropriate books from its elementary school libraries. OSDE threatened to downgrade the district’s accreditation if it did not remove the two books in question—”The Kite Runner” and “The Glass Castle”—from elementary school shelves.
The district stated that the State Board of Education ‘does not have the power to enact the rule it is attempting to enforce,’ and that the Oklahoma Attorney General advised the State Board of Education that said rules would be ‘unenforceable’ before they were enacted.
The neighboring Deer Creek School District issued a statement on February 21 in support of Edmond Public School’s decision to petition the Oklahoma Supreme Court.
Walters explained to News9 that he after receiving complaints from parents in the Edmond Public School district about the two books, he had a committee review them. Because the books deal with mature, sexual themes, the committee recommended that they only be available to high school students, and not be required reading.
Walter said the Edmond Public Schools agreed with those recommendations, but after he told them to prove that they weren’t making them available to younger students, they petitioned the Supreme Court.
“The next thing we hear from the district is they’re suing us to eliminate the entire rule,” he said.
Edmond Public Schools continues to lie. pic.twitter.com/7DhaCbJkeC
— Superintendent Ryan Walters (@RyanWaltersSupt) February 27, 2024
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