"We are not consumers, but citizens, when it comes to schools"

Excellent opinion piece in The Hechinger Report:

Public schools are a public good that we have forged together through public conversations, elected school boards, and democratic policymaking. Within schools, we should deliberate, craft, and institute the aims we seek. Moreover, public schools are special because they impart the skills and knowledge necessary for future generations to continue to deliberate the public goods they will uphold. Public schools are places where children learn how to exchange and respond to the ideas of others as they balance their own individual needs with needs in their communities. They are places where children learn to be a public.

But do read it all.