Do you find it ridiculous how public schools are structured?

That is the exact reason I took my kids out of public school and educated them at home. This has only happened within the last few decades..I would say since 1985 or so. It was not the case when I graduated in 1969 and during my school years. I was one of those students who would debate the teacher or ask questions because I lived outside of the box. My parents encouraged me to not question the status-quo, so to say. MY kids were the same kind of thinker that I was and they were both getting into trouble for challenging the accepted wisdom. I home schooled both until they graduated from H.S. at 16 and let them spread their wings and go off to college. There are still some schools who don't confine our children to the box, but they are hard to find.

Actually, it was far worse when I was in high school. Students were expected to be respectful, not talk out, etc. If you did, you were punished. Detentions, suspensions and the like. Parents didn't think they kids were perfect little prodigies who could do no wrong. What I think is ridulous is the narcissistic bunch we've become, where if everyone doesn't agree with us we toss a tantrum. That's all the religion and politics threads on this site are.

By the way, I support the right to homeschool. I don't agree that all homeschooled kids are out if the box thinkers. Some are. Some just want to sanitize their world and make sure their out of the box opinions are never questioned.

My teachers are pretty good. I was never punished for my opinion.

Yeah, that's about the size of it. The problem with homeschooling, though, is that most parents haven't got a clue how to teach critical thinking or anything else. They buy a packet of exercises and the kids come out spouting crap about how the world was created 6000 years ago and how America is paradise on earth.