Education

OCPA condemns OSSAA defiance of open-transfer law

August 18, 2025

Staff

OKLAHOMA CITY (August 18, 2025) — Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs President Jonathan Small today criticized the Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association (OSSAA) for arbitrarily banning four teenagers from playing basketball for Glencoe High School. The four youth used the state’s open-transfer process to attend the Glencoe district in the 2025-2026 school year.

“Unelected, taxpayer-funded bureaucrats at OSSAA appear to constantly scheme up ways to undermine and ignore state law, which allows students to transfer to public-school districts regardless of where they live,” Small said. “OSSAA produced no evidence of any ‘recruitment’ of student athletes at Glencoe, closed their eyes to reams of evidence indicating that no recruitment occurred, and even ignored the fact that at least one of these young men sought a transfer due to alleged mistreatment by a coach at his former school. The OSSAA is a quasi-state entity and must be brought under serious state oversight. The OSSAA’s war on parents and students must be defeated.”