Sorry. I typed out a reply, but it's like 5 pages. There's a lot wrong. Here's something extremely boiled down:
Too many administrators. Students having their phones in school. Out of control administrators who waste teachers' time. Students roaming halls. Phones. No consequences for skipping class, roaming halls, or cheating (administrators not enforcing discipline). Administrators desperate to get everyone to pass and graduate. Phones. Administrators pressuring teachers to pass students. No dress code. Endless accommodations for students. Endless meetings soaking up valuable teacher time. Administrators disallowing midterms and finals because that would cause too many students to fail their classes (now, many teachers are required to have projects and presentations, or similar as midterms and as finals). Valuable instruction time lost due to standardized testing. Rampant cheating. Zero consequences for students' behavior (extremely rare to see an out-of-school suspension, and expulsion is unheard of these days). Block scheduling (4 long periods per day) because students won't do homework (or will just cheat/copy/paste). Administrators constantly pushing group work, projects, posters (rather than real focused work).
Public school teacher here. Public schools have been in a downward slide for decades. If you want to know what's wrong, just brace yourself and ask a teacher. Alas, many people want to believe it's the teachers' fault, and so rarely bother to ask the teachers. Or, failing that, people think it's just that teachers aren't paid enough and think more money will fix the problems (more money would be nice, but that's not the problem).
It's very straightforward to fix public schools, but, in my view:
* few people actually want to know what the problems are,
* only a fraction of those people will speak up and say something about addressing the problems, and
* only a small fraction of those people would have the wherewithal to actually push for the solutions to be implemented.
Fact is, good teachers are constantly being driven out of the profession. It's just too arduous and heartbreaking, and every year it gets worse.
Too many administrators. Students having their phones in school. Out of control administrators who waste teachers' time. Students roaming halls. Phones. No consequences for skipping class, roaming halls, or cheating (administrators not enforcing discipline). Administrators desperate to get everyone to pass and graduate. Phones. Administrators pressuring teachers to pass students. No dress code. Endless accommodations for students. Endless meetings soaking up valuable teacher time. Administrators disallowing midterms and finals because that would cause too many students to fail their classes (now, many teachers are required to have projects and presentations, or similar as midterms and as finals). Valuable instruction time lost due to standardized testing. Rampant cheating. Zero consequences for students' behavior (extremely rare to see an out-of-school suspension, and expulsion is unheard of these days). Block scheduling (4 long periods per day) because students won't do homework (or will just cheat/copy/paste). Administrators constantly pushing group work, projects, posters (rather than real focused work).
There's more but I'm trying to stop typing now.