Advice Needed

Hello all, I've got a few questions. I am relocating to the southern cal area. I've been looking around at different nursing programs (LVN or RN)and trying to figure out what my best options are. I've spoken to both public and private schools. Public seems to have 2-5 year waiting list.I don't really want to wait that long. Then the other option is going private, the dilema with that is price. $25,000-30,000 for the lvn program. I guess what my questions are, what are the pros and cons of going public or private. I think I will most likely go private as I don't feel like waiting around so long to get started. Some of the schools that I am consideing are CNI in Costa Mesa/ Orange, Premiere Career College , Concorde. If you have attened any of these programs and have any useful feedback, I would greatly appreacate it.
One more thing, I've heard that there are lots of grants availible for nursing students right now. Does anybody know anything about that??
Looking forward to hearing from you!

S.