This is naive, in my opinion.

Even in the public school system there is a class divide system, it's just based in real estate instead of private school enrollment.

At the same time, you can't abolish private schools without abolishing home schooling, which literally becomes forcing all children to be educated by government institutions...which is bad.

Public schooling alone would be much better off if it were more decentralized, with less federal involvement. Most of the federal programs that the teachers I've spoken with deem to be necessary could be addressed without being tied into the school system directly (like free and reduced lunches) - in much the same way that health care doesn't need to be tied to your employer.

The issue is that people don't take ownership in their public schools because they don't feel they have ownership in their public schools.

Just as an example, remember the school system blow up in North Carolina over the "bathroom bill" stuff? Parents were losing their minds - in some cases without good reason but in other cases with perfectly good reason. They didn't get a say in what happened. They didn't get to decide how to handle things in a manner they were comfortable with.

Instead, they watched the threat of having federal funding yanked from their schools if they didn't comply. Stuff like that is why public schools don't get as much support as people wish they would.

I'll go ahead and tell you, I had no intention of sending my kids to private school as I was ideologically opposed to it...yet when all of the common core stuff started happening and I saw the stories coming from my friends from college as their A students were coming home in tears for getting correct answers the wrong way...it made me want the politics out of my kids education.

The school they go to actually teaches the common core approaches to things as well. The difference is that instead of rushing to implement it based on mandates, they researched options, all of the teachers at the school who are...as it turns out...qualified to decide these things, made a decision on what they wanted to do and rolled it out slowly over a period of years. Parents were kept in the loop the entire way and they did it with zero disruptions.

You can't do that in today's public school system.

There are a lot of other factors, but for me it boiled down to wanting a stable and consistent environment for my children - at least when they are in early developmental ages.

I'm strongly considering moving back to public for middle/high school though.

And for consistency sake, I want to be absolutely clear here...I realize I'm lucky to be able to afford it. That's EXACTLY why I advocate for school choice programs because I want to be able to tell other parents about this great school and know that they can decide to send their kids there if they want to, regardless of their financial background.

I get all of the terrible stuff that gets written about people's "devilish" intentions behind vouchers or choice or whatever else. For me it simply boils down to knowing that my kids go to a great school and I want everybody to have the same true freedom of choice. Nothing more, nothing less. In our current system, the only people with all the options are the people who can afford those options (be it via houses zoned for specific schools, private or home schooling groups).