You are right. Georgia has/offers and supports a good number of get-your-kids-a-head-start-if-you-want-to programs and is very supportive of home schoolers, virtual schoolers and kids in the hospital who cannot attend. While the run of the mill public curricula are mediocre, my 3 bright kids have not suffered in Gwinnett County public schools. The teaching is fine, and the courses are generally challenging enough. (my 9th grader works at a freshman-in-college level) The policies are my issue, especially in the middle schools.
But my youngest is now out of middle school.
And lastly we have a good selection of private schools in the area, which are affordable if you choose to live within means.
Rural Georgia counties typically have one elem, one middle, and one HS, with a segregation academy (small private school), that pops up every now and then but typically is not academically strong. Our closest private school is 35 miles away on a two-lane road. Vouchers are a great idea for metro areas, but insignificant in rural areas.
The lower income/or minority students tend to "suffer" the most in rural schools, as expectations are lowered to keep the dropouts in school. Mediocrity is repeatedly rewarded. Then you have the whole "who's who" in town - superintendent's kids getting online p.e. class or being advanced to select classes because they are "so much smarter" than all of the other students. I never realized a small rural town in the south could have so much liberal elitism.