1) Public can mean relocating, if you want a good district, and higher housing costs. So that sucks. Even the good ones are usually just OK, really, with some e

1) Public can mean relocating, if you want a good district, and higher housing costs. So that sucks. Even the good ones are usually just OK, really, with some exceptions. Whole exercise is kinda horrifying, even if you have a very normal considered-good experience of it—personally I'm very uncomfortable with the basic structure of public schools. Free buses are very nice. 2) Private's often as bad or worse—just being private doesn't mean it's an improvement. Private schools often pay worse than public (total comp) so consider what sort of employee pool they're drawing from. The exceptions tend to be the "prep" variety which are less common and are eye-wateringly expensive unless you're fairly poor (most have generous scholarships) but nonetheless capable of raising a kid who the admissions folks (for whatever reason) like. If you can't afford even-more-expensive boarding schools you're probably looking at just a couple quality private schools in a given city in most cases, if any, and they may not be close to your house. Exceptions include some (only some, you gotta do your homework) Catholic schools, though you may have trouble getting in and will likely pay more if your family's not Catholic—there's a process, and you can probably fake your way in, but it'll take time and commitment and planning in advance by at least a year, I'd say, plus you gotta be comfortable, you know, repeatedly lying to clergy. If you want something that breaks out of the typical mold[1] you're either talking seminar-type classes (so, prep, expensive, and not available everywhere) or hippy-dippy might-work-for-your-kids-hard-to-say-until-you-try unschool-alike stuff (still not cheap). 3) Homeschool's wicked-expensive too if you're losing a salary for it, especially with just one or two kids. Not every parent's cut out for being home alone with the kiddos every day, all year, too. Some are, some aren't, may not figure it out until you try. Also not everyone's great at teaching though if your kids are above-average in the intelligence department it's not hard to at least do better than your average public school, given the pace they move at and the much worse instructor-to-student ratio. It's real work, though, regardless. Exceptions all over for the above I'm sure, but that's the gist. We're doing public. I kinda hate it but the other options are out of reach for one reason or another. [1 EDIT] by "typical mold" I mean isn't structured more or less the same as public school.