That sounds like he needs childcare, not education. That is the responsibility of his parents.
Public school is pretty much the answer to the problem of what do with families that can't individually afford full-time childcare or afford to have one parent stay home. It's easy to sit in your armchair and say something like "well they shouldn't have kids then" but the problem is that, largely, this system works!
And two parents working full-time, with a single child, do not have the resources or additional children required to provide a classroom environment. We're both software engineers. We prefer our children to be taught by people who specialize in teaching children.
Your parent got downvoted because the comment is a shallow dismissal.
But my point is that school, at least K-8, for the parent functions both as daycare and education. The pandemic and virtual classrooms is making schools provide the education but not the daycare and we're seeing how unprepared the US is to lose this service for a while. Parents still have to go to work but also can't just leave their kids at home alone, and having someone stay with them 9-5 to keep them focused on school is more expensive than a lot of families can afford.
No, it's not.
> two parents working full-time, with a single child, do not have the resources or additional children required to provide a classroom environment
You said your children need childcare as much as education. If you don't have the resources to provide what you believe your children need, perhaps you shouldn't have had children. If you want both parents to work full time, there's certainly an expectation that the children will need care. Why did you assume the state (read: your fellow taxpayers) would or should subsidize that? You are reaping the benefits of having children without bearing all the responsibilities. This situation is simply revealing the negative externalities many parents force on their neighbors.
When you're figuring out how the finances for raising a kid are going to work out it would be kinda weird assume that this core institution that you pay property taxes for and in a lot of cases likely moved for would suddenly go away and that you'd have to figure out how to afford the full-time salary of an in-home caretaker or how to live without an income (but that doesn't really work out for single parents).
This really isn't a question of bearing the responsibilities or whatever. Even if you send your kids to private school you're still in the same boat. This new disease-laden world is wildly inefficient because you can't benefit from having having a 30+ to 1 child/adult ratio and parents are just kinda stuck.
Do you know anything about raising kids? Or teaching? Because childcare is a necessary component of education. Because they're kids, not mature scholars. Raising them to maturity requires a combined effort of parents and teachers.
> If you don't have the resources to provide what you believe your children need, perhaps you shouldn't have had children.
Fun fact! I didn't choose to have children! I chose to raise a child as my own, who is not related to me by blood. I know, I know, I'm such a freeloader. But we live in a world where this child is alive and needs care beyond what his parents can provide in a vacuum. Do we as a society (a) neglect the child and shunt him off into the prison system to the tune of millions of taxpayer dollars, (b) murder the child for being a useless burden, or (c) nurture the child with the goal of raising a productive (and profitable?!) member of society? I choose (c), it sounds like you prefer (a). Penny wise, pound foolish.
> If you want both parents to work full time, there's certainly an expectation that the children will need care. Why did you assume the state (read: your fellow taxpayers) would or should subsidize that?
As the sibling commenter notes, I pay my taxes. Like most people, I generally expect that public schools will be available. Like most engineers, my specialization is not early childhood education. The cool thing about living in a society is that it gives us the freedom to specialize, and we take advantage of economies of scale.
Can I puddle my own iron and forge a knife out of it? Yes, I guess, if I found a good ore deposit. It would take about a week, and the knife would be absolute garbage compared to one bought for $1 at value village, because I'm under no dilusion that I could make my own steel. Add another month if I'm not allowed to use a hammer or anvil and need to fashion those out of stone. Fuck, I forgot gloves and tongs... this is going to take a while. Self-reliance is a myth. We live in a society and I pay (a lot of) taxes to be a part of it. And yes, as the sibling commenter notes, I have built plans around this society being here tomorrow.
> You are reaping the benefits of having children without bearing all the responsibilities.
Yes, I'm reaping the benefits of... what now? Sorry, no, this child costs me time, money, energy, and flexibility, and I'm only present in his life because I love him and his biological parent.
> This situation is simply revealing the negative externalities many parents force on their neighbors.
Well over half of the the houses in my neighborhood have children. And 100% of humans had biological parents. Are 100% of us negative externalities? Even when we pay taxes?