Neither there are teachers like Chips. You are right.

"Rulers must be philosophers or philosophers must rule "

I think it was possible for schools to be life-affirming, as shown in this splendid dramatization of the 1930s Hilton novella. My impressions of College, from which I went down 45 years ago, suggest it was possible. It is admittedly true that College can be only an analogy for a school, and that bad schools have always existed. (signed) Toomas Karmo, in Tartumaa County, Estonia (but in UK 1974-1978, in a part of the then Estonian exile diaspora)