Public School vs. Home School

 Now for all of last school year I was enrolled in virtual school, due to concerns with omicron and me not being old enough to get vaccinated. This year, I've been fully vaccinated, so I decided to move back to the public school system after two and a half years of online school, and let me just say, it's been a rough adjustment. Public schools and virtual schools each have their own upsides and downsides, so I'm going to list them out for you so that you know what you expect if you enroll in these schools. 

 Now, the main focus of public schools is on efficiency and learning, while also giving you opportunities to socialize, and make friends. They're good enough at what they do: which is teaching you, but they have quite a bit of problems. For example, bathroom breaks. If you want to go to the bathroom, you have to sit there, and raise your hand, and then wait for the teacher to answer you, and pray that they actually let you go to the bathroom. But chances are, if they're in the middle of teaching, they'll say no, and even if they do say yes, you'll be missing out on class time, which means you might miss an important lesson.

 There are some bigger problems as well. For example, public school is stressful. You only get one shot with tests and assignments, and if you blow it, then you're screwed. It's also not easy to see everything you have to do. If you forget about an assignment's due date are what homework you have to do, then you're screwed. You also have to rush across the campus to get to your next class before your receive a tardy, and you have to do all that with a heavy backpack on, while hundreds of other children in the same predicament rush around campus.

 This is where virtual schools come in. Virtual schools are all about quality of life improvements. You can eat and go to the bathroom whenever you want.  If you don't have an important school supply on you right now, no worries, you can just go around and search for it. You can choose when your lessons start and end. You can wake up as late as you want, and you don't need to spend however many minutes trying to get to school on time. You can see exactly what you have to do, and when you have to do it, and you can do it whenever you want as long as it's in a certain time frame. 

 Of course, with good, there comes bad, and virtual school has a lot of downsides compared to public schools. For one, you don't get a lot of physical activity. Though this may not be a problem for physically active people, I am not a physically active person, and therefore I don't end up getting a lot of exercise in virtual school. However, this is a tiny problem compared to the biggest reason people stay away from virtual school. There are no other students or teachers, or at least not ones you tend to interact with. This means that there is nobody to keep you in check and make sure that you do your work and turn in assignments on time. If you have a question you have to send an email, and hope that they respond quickly. There are no students either, meaning you social interactions with other people are limited.

 In the end, they each have their upsides and downsides, and it's up to you to decide what you want based on your own interests and needs. Anyways, see you next blog!