Parental rights, as now practiced, insists that parents should have a hand in determining what is being taught in the public schools. This is essentially a political/ideological position and is happening independently of parents advocating for their own children. There are several big problems with insisting that parental rights groups should be allowed to help formulate what schools are teaching.
First, and most obviously, parents are not a monolith. What one parent believes should be taught is not necessarily the same thing another parent thinks is appropriate.
Second, squeaky wheels get greased. Even if we ignore the fact that different parents have different interests, it will likely be the parents who most effectively (and loudly) advocate for their positions who win, regardless of whether that creates better education.
Third, given diverse political perspectives, it is likely that no consensus will emerge as to what schools in various locales should be teaching. Today, we have state boards of education and national frameworks that at least provide some assurance that public school curricula will coalesce around some common points. If the functions of state and federal education policymakers are usurped by parents at the local level, we may lose the kinds of common threads that stitch the nation together.
If we cede public education to parental rights groups we may very well be condemning ourselves to even wider fractionalization of citizens.
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