Yes. I graduated in one of the last classes before the National Education Association took over the local school.
A huge difference in standards and outcome followed. Not for the better!
One of my girl friends taught in a special school in NYC. They did control admission, and they taught for aviation mechanics certification. But, as teachers must, every visit included watching her grade papers and the looseness that was required in the grading was absolutely demoralizing.
I’m sure they learned SOMETHING because she taught inner city kids to love Shakespeare and they adored her and protected her on her way to and from school. But there has to be more than caring and peripheral exposure to good literature. There has to be standards so that you don’t misspell headlines depressingly often in newspapers, etc.