The bottom line is what are you willing to give up to achieve your goals. Either public or private, it is the work you put in and use the resources that are available to you that will make the difference, irrespective of where you go for high school. Colleges expect you have taken the classes with most rigor available to you, and perform well, they expect you to be an engaged member of the society, use your time productively by participating in EC’s that interests you, and overall demonstrate that you are capable of handling an independent college life and meet the academic rigor of that college.
If you live in a area where the public school has good resources, caters to your academic interests, provides you with ample sports and other clubs to keep you engaged and teaches you values of being a good global citizen then there should be no reason to consider a private school.
Private schools usually provide ample resources and EC opportunities, but at elite private schools the academic rigor is very high and the volume of work required may prevent you participating in many EC’s and club activities. Its is also very hard to maintain you GPA mainly because of the class sizes and academic strength of the fellow student body. It will definitely groom you in to a well rounded, confident person. If you do maintain a good GPA, you will have a good chance of getting in to a Good college.
@katliamom
“There are also highly selective, elite, highly academic privates that ARE Ivy feeder schools. If you’ve got the academic mojo (and hopefully money) to get into Andover, St Pauls, Groton, Choate, etc. odds are you will get into a selective college/university.”
This is not entirely true, even at these “elite privates” there are ladders of social class, which range from super wealthy parents who donate buildings and endowments to these privates, to upper middle class parents who will shell out their hard earned money with the hope of providing “a leg up” for their children, to athletes and URM who will be recruited with scholarships. This divide spills over to dorms, and classes and eventually to who gets channeled in to Ivy league.
They "guarantee an Ivy or top 20 schools to those who have a stellar GPA, so attending these schools will not guarantee and IVY admission.