In
Britain a Public School is an
expensive and usually well-thought of
private school. What you
Americans would call a public school we would call a
State School (despite the fact that we have no
states as Americans would understand them). Of course you also call your
universities "
schools" whereas us
Brits reserve the word purely for places of
primary or
secondary education. If you want a British word that can be used for a place of either
secondary or
tertiary education then you might find "
college" suffices, although of course in north America that word almost always denotes a university.
Confused yet?
Some examples of famous British public schools would include: Eton, Harrow, Winchester, Westminster.