Today, the New York Times ran an interesting article titled, "Public Schools Perform Near Private Ones in Study."

According to the Times, "The Education Department reported on Friday that children in public schools generally performed as well or better in reading and mathematics than comparable children in private schools. The exception was in eighth-grade reading, where the private school counterparts fared better.

"The report, which compared fourth- and eighth-grade reading and math scores in 2003 from nearly 7,000 public schools and more than 530 private schools, also found that conservative Christian schools lagged significantly behind public schools on eighth-grade math."

The article includes a summary of the report and includes a link to the full report in PDF format.

Gifted children are not specifically addressed in the study; however, this study offers some very strong validation for public school teachers and administrators.