Starting school at 7:30 has negative academic value, because half the students aren't even awake yet.
It's done because it's convenient for parents, who have to drop their kids off, who, for some reason, are 'incapable' of walking to school like their parents did.
A class of 32-35 students per teacher has no positive academic value. It is purely a cost-saving measure, that leaves everyone with a half-assed education.
Having to ask permission to piss, hall passes, limits on the number of students allowed to use the restroom at a time (typically 1/class) has more in common with a prison, or maybe boot camp, than a school. And, of course, there's no time in the 5-minute between class break for everyone who needs to, to both use the facilities, and get to their class, on time. It is done purely for social control reasons.
The expectation that teachers also do the job of social workers results in a lot of anti-academic outcomes. When your teacher, in a class of 30, is more concerned about how to deal with behaviour problems for a kid whose parents are, say, raging, shitty alcoholics, is not particularly conductive to the academic development of their peers. But that's not the school's, or the teacher's fault, so I can give that a pass.
AI essay grading (which is a more modern development, and works about as well as asking a monkey to grade essays) is the new thing that's popular to complain about. Negative academic value, but it saves time for teachers, who don't want to spend hours grading the hours of homework they assign. I don't blame them for preferring to have a 10-hour workday, instead of a 15-hour one, but still...
Some teachers give out bathroom passes that if you do not use them for the semester they can be turned in for extra credit. Extra credit for holding your bladder. Educational value: zero
I think these are valid criticisms of school/school life and I agree that there is room for improvement. I don't feel that these issues mean that school doesn't value academics or supports the addition of things that don't have academic value. Operating an education system at scale, on budget and effectively seems like a herculean task and I'm willing to accept the end result won't be perfect.
