[jyl]

"Then what do we need schools for?"

It is not a simplistic "all or nothing" situation. Schools do some of it, parents do some of it, how much from each depends on a lot of things.

My kids, for example, learn most of their stuff from school. My wife and I read to them, help w/ math and spelling/conjugation drills, the occasional question on science, and push them to read books. We probably spend 1/2 to 1 hour/night on average, school spends 7 hours/day. Time considerations alone mean we need the school to do most of the education. Ask home-schoolers - teaching kids is a time-consuming task.

"if the parents don't have the tools to start with how do you expect them to teach their kids?"

Even if a kid has zero parent help and is himself neither bright nor motivated, I think they should at least emerge from school with a basic level of reading, writing, math, general knowledge, etc. That's a minimum. Anyone who is not retarded or in a really dysfunctional home should be at least at that level. I know it doesn't necessarily happen, but that would be a goal, I think.