This conversation about "getting back to basics" in education, "reading, 'riting and 'rithetric" and "being able to get a job" as somehow the pride and centerpoint of education is so, so lame. The fact that many people seem to espouse these concepts in such a simplistic way is probably a poor reflection on our teaching and understanding what "an education" could/should be.
Bit of reality. Education has always had a basic social engineering component in its make up. The education system wherever and whatever it comprised was about transmitting intended social mores to a new generation. Ancient Rome, Medieval England, Victorian England, Soviet Russia, 20th Century Australia everywhere the concept of what we want our next generation to look like was a bedrock of education.
It is never value neutral. In that sense the question to ask is "What social mores do we want our children to grow up with?" Will they be co-operative or fiercely individual and competitive ? Will they respect all people and cultures or believe there is "one true faith" and anyone else is very much second best. Will they enjoy learning about new things and the world for its own sake or will they see learning as focused mostly on very specific outcomes ie getting a job ?
Basic skills. I'll sum up a teaching philosphy I used. " Learning how to ask a question. Learning where to look for the answers. Learning how to smell the BS". Of course one can learn how to read. But how do we learn whether what you read is worthwhile, honest and useful? We can learn how to write as well. But again "How are we going to use this skill?" Making Advertising ads for houses? Constructing creative lagal frameworks for totally dodgy busineses? Making up lies to advance evil causes? Ditto Maths. And this doesn't even touch the fact that Science, Languages, History, Geography, Health Education, Creative Arts and a score of other subjects offer a richness to life that is essential if we are developing a whole new person.
Back to the topic. Once upon a time gays were deranged, criminal or depraved. Just look at the laws that existed barely one generation ago. Hetrosexual sex was circumscribed with a very particular ideology, largely religious. The concept that people could have sexual relations outside a male/female sanctified wedding was very bolshy.
Do we still think these precepts are "right" ? How do we want our children to behave towards friends and themselves if they don't fit these structures? What type of "social engineering" do we want to see in schools ?