It makes me sad how little we value education beyond gainful employment.
School's primary purpose is to prepare people to be functioning members of society.
I can prepare almost anyone to be a functioning member of society so long as you don't want them to be capable of thought or creativity. They won't be a functioning member (or a well-functioning member) of a society ruled by a democratic system of government, though.
Education is about teaching children how to think, communicate, and act as much as giving them specific tools for future careers. Never mind the plethora of studies that have found links between arts education and performance in other educational/vocational areas. It's hardly esoteric.
CS is incredible to teach how to think. Algorithms, using logic to solve problems, decomposing a problem, etc... Theses are all skills that make you think, that push you to UNDERSTANDS better. Personally I never seen my college classes as nothing else than learning to learn, because that's computer science. More often than not, the lack of information given by the teacher wasn't a proof of incompetence but a way to test our capacity to search and discover by our self.
Sure I learned a bit in my french classes, sure I learned a bit in my history classes, but I never ever learned to think in any of theses classes except CS. I only learned to apply theses skills.
It seems at least possible that this might be due to schools that are better funded tend to offer more arts education, and the better funding would also presumably increase the quality of the education in other areas. Without seeing the studies, it seems hard to conclude that the arts education is the cause of the better performance in other areas.
read: "productive economic units."
Also, ever since we started making schools actively hostile to religion, I question how appropriate it is as a vehicle for teaching civic values.
Basic numeracy also has value outside of making people more employable, and a reason that there's a nascent movement to replace Algebra 2 with something closer to a basic course on statistics and critical data thinking.
I attended 12 years of Catholic school and while some of my Jesuit high school religion classes were interesting, they were not an especially good use of my time (although they did give me a nuanced understanding of Islam that became valuable for understanding the world later on, which I appreciate). I'd probably have been better off in the public high school my kids went to. And I went to an atypically disciplined and college-focused religious school.
That seems outside the normal experience & expectations of public school in the USA. Here it seems like language, civics, and basic skills are the job.
Information can be transmitted by almost anyone, but a deep love of something can only be instilled through a personal relationship of mutual respect and trust.