Private or Public

With the school year approaching and Madi getting close to starting school, I'm left asking myself which is better, private school or public school? Now my Madi won't be enrolling in school until next year, and that's only if we decide to put her in private school because most public schools do not offer head start(or 3K is what it's called sometimes) unless you are considered a "low income" family, which is a criteria that is pretty hard to meet. However, the private school I was thinking of enrolling Madi in is 8a.m.-3p.m., Mon.-Fri., which has me thinking that this might be too much for her. But that could just be me not wanting to let her go so soon. In my opinion there is no transition from being at home all day to being in school all day. In public schools the kids don't start going to school all day until they are in kindergarden, which will be 6yrs old for Madi, she will actually be 5 turning 6 in November. At the same time I don't want Madi to fall behind because of my insecurities, in today's time I think it would be to her advantage to be ahead of the game as soon as possible. But honestly, how ahead will she be if she's being overloaded from the beginning. And not to mention the cost of the whole thing. That also factors into our decision. Well, as you can see, I go back and forth with this decision all the time. Luckily we have a whole year to decide & get Madi ready if we do decide on Catholic school. My nephew Matthew will be starting catholic school this year so we wish him luck and maybe his experience will bring some light on our dilemma.