Two of my children attended a great private school. The school was having financial difficulty and didn’t want to increase the already expensive tuition so they opened it to low income students paid for by the state. Within 5 years the school closed. The low income students didn’t abide by the dress code, didn’t do the class work, and were disruptive. I stayed for 2 years until my son graduated but took my daughter out of the school and sent her to the Catholic school where her other two brothers were enrolled. Other parents did the same.
I asked my daughter the other day why she and her brothers were so well behaved. She said I always told them if they gave me any trouble I would put them in public school and to them that was a fate worse than death.
My younger kids have never been in the public schools, but they have heard the horror stories from my oldest, who was in public schools until 7th grade. I admit that I sometimes use the threat of attending there as a way to instill good behavior. They watched the news reports recently of a local teacher duct-taping her student to his chair and threatening to kill students in a bar, so I think that helped with the reinforcement as well! Their fear is not unreasonable, in my view.