Carolyn Hax: Pro-public-school dad won’t consider private for his son

Our son attended the public elementary school but is now going into the sixth grade. I hate to say it, but the public middle and high schools here are very poorly ranked. The buildings are outdated. There aren’t enough teachers. With some financial aid, we could afford to send our son to the private school.

My husband could not be more against this. His argument is that it is the responsibility of people with resources to set an example and work to ensure that the public schools are improved and properly funded. He also believes you can get a good education anywhere if you put in the work and have a good support system (like we would be for our son).

I agree with him in principle, but I’m not so sure this is reality. I think we need to do whatever is best for our son and to me that means sending him to the better school. My husband doesn’t even want to discuss it with me or our son, and I think our son would be hesitant to weigh in because he can see how passionate his father is.

I don’t really see any way to compromise. What do you think?

— Public or Private School?

Public or Private School?: If you’re asking what I think of public vs. private, then I think your husband’s immovability makes it moot. (Full disclosure: My kids have attended both — currently private.) At this point, if I were in your place, I hope I would have the presence of mind to be talking to him not about the two types of schools but about the impropriety of one parent refusing to let the other have any say in such a (potentially) consequential decision about the child they are rearing together, and refusing to let a sixth grader have any agency in his own education.

I have a serious problem with both. He can be zealous in his mind and fierce in his opinions, but if he won’t tolerate or consider any dissent from an equal or his charge, then he’s a tyrant.

On the tyranny vs. partnership issue, put me down for partnership. 100.

Readers’ thoughts:

· Then I would encourage him to start going to school board meetings to engage on proposed policy changes, writing your elected officials and demanding more resources, maybe seeing what he can do to support the teachers or administrators at the school — all of which, I would hazard to guess, he isn’t currently doing. Talk, after all, is the cheapest commodity there is, and while it’s one thing to use your kid as a way to set an example, it’s a true mark of commitment to actually, you know, use yourself.

· Which fit is best for your kid? The “better” private school would be heaven for some, and a torture chamber to others. Is it sports mad and you have a theater kid? Is it four AP classes a semester or else and your kid wants to be a firefighter?

· Yes, kid should be looped in. We tell ours on high-stakes things, “We will consider your input, but we will still make the decision.”