Personally? Going to a public school was an extremely detrimental experience. Family easily had the financial means for private school, but was worried that growing up with the children of doctors, lawyers, etc for friends would make my siblings and I "snobby."
Got pretty much relentlessly bullied by others, since I was a trusting and easily swayed little idiot with more pocket money than sense. Massive anti-intellectual streak amongst the student body. You learned to dumb down your accent, speech, and performance to avoid painting that bulls-eye on your back. A friend had it even worse because he had to deal with accusations of "acting white" whenever he excelled. Really bothers me to see how this clearly clever person guy had to sabotage his own future to survive in that environment.
They shied away from physical attacks in third grade after I eventually snapped and beat one bully so hard his arm, nose, and jaw were broken (took some legal shenanigans to avoid expulsion for that one) but they quickly figured out that a steady stream of psychological torment was more amusing and easy to get away with. More often than not in school, the bullied would end up in equal or more trouble than the aggressor thanks to "zero tolerance" bullshit.
Teachers were an extremely incompetent lot, 2-3 good ones and a mob of them who gave tenure a bad name. Had one that was so strung out on stolen pain meds that she slept all day and we'd just watch movies over and over again that semester. Math skills never recovered from that debacle.
Started getting sexually abused when I was 10-11, teachers and local law enforcement pretty much laughed it off because the perpetrator was female. Relentless torment from classmates for "being a faggot" because I didn't enjoy it, pretty much everyone said I was gay because of that and rumors that sprang from it. Still extremely uncomfortable around more feminine women; triggers a borderline fight or flight response.
I was extremely unprepared for college thanks to that place; only two of us in that entire graduating class managed to make it past freshman year. Picked up a non-prestige accent/dialect that is rather stigmatized in the process, and gets major shit outside the deep South. Feel like a total uncouth rube whenever I interact with people who were raised in proper bourgeois/upper class environments from day one; there are so many social cues and unspoken tricks of etiquette to deal with.
Fun part is, that public school was one of the top ranked in the state. Not a snowball's chance in hell my kids are going anywhere near a public school. Either top notch private academy or homeschooling, without question.