Why is Prince George not going to secondary school until after he turns 13?

[MinnieMounjaro]

Prince William reveals Prince George, 12, is already boarding at £10,669-a-term Lambrook School mol.im/a/15846933 via https://dailym.ai/android

I saw this article in the DM saying Prince George is currently boarding at Lambrook "ahead of moving to his secondary school in September". He turns 13 in July so the thought occurred to me - why is he still in primary school? Should he not have started secondary in 2024 when he was 11?

I think Beatrice was the only one of her generation in the RF not to go to boarding school and i don't think any of the younger generation are at day only schools.

Maybe he keeps getting held back a year

God that's atrocious. I find this incessant scrabbling around for anything to write about the children quite revolting.

We used to have two middle schools here, one coed one catholic one. Both were state school

Most prep school go up to 13 and then you move.

Some are all the way through but for a lot you change.

The area where we live has 3 different routes for state schools

Primary R - YR6 (4-11yr old)
Secondary YR7- YR11 (11-16yr old)

Infant R - YR2 (4 - 7yr old)
Junior YR3 - YR6 (7-11yr old)
Secondary YR7 - YR11 (11-16yr old

First R - YR4 (4 - 9yr old)
Middle YR5 - YR8 (9-13yr old)
Upper Secondary YR9 - YR11 (13 - 16yr old)

Beatrice went to boarding school.
St George's Ascot.

My DCs flexi boarded from age 11. Usually one or two nights a week, if they had clubs that were finishing late.

As others have said prep goes to year 8. Seniors start year 9.

Yes the day he Charlotte and Lewis started at current school was the day the Queen died.

🤣

Boarding school is essentially just posh foster care. It’s awful the royals send off their kids instead of being present and active parents.

And yet W and C have been criticised for spending so much time with their children 🤷‍♀️

Loads of people on MN have their children in state schools but surely most people have a bit of an idea about the different school systems in the UK?

Modern boarding schools are very different now. I'm in the US and we switched from state to private boarding this year because of a family medical crisis which had the potential to leave DD15 at home alone more than we wanted, and in many ways it takes up much more of my time than the state school did.

Because we are only an hour away she comes home every weekend. I'm constantly driving to the school for parent events, school events, dropping off stuff for her, taking her to medical appointments etc.

Parents are expected to be full on partners in all aspects of the education process. And because the class sizes are so much smaller there's so much more attention on each child and therefore the parents too.

There's a website to track exactly which class she's in at any second in the day - you get pinged if they are late to class or miss one. There's real-time feedback on academics and sports. You can see which assignments are due, late, never received. Photos every day to see what everyone is doing socially in the evenings and weekends.

And that's not even getting to the emails from the trustees and the fundraisers who are constantly doing events and emails about donations to the endowment fund.

I guess the parents who are a thousand miles away aren't quite so active but there seem to be more opportunities to be hands-on if you want to be.

George, Charlotte and Louis all started at Lambrook on the same day - 7th September. QEII died the following day - but crack on!

year 9 (13+) is a typical entry point for traditional public schools, like Eton, Harrow, Tonbridge et al with majority of pupils coming from Prep schools up to year 8 and using Common Entrance for assessment. Some private schools also have an intake at year 7 (11+) or have a feeder prep running up to year 8.

It really isn’t. My DCs loved their boarding school. They were mainly day pupils but did love the occasional boarding. During GCSEs and in sixth form they boarded the entire week - their choice. Youngest chose to move to a different school though.

My DC also loved having the flexi boarding option. They were never forced to board.

I grew up in a deprived area and we did primary 5-9, middle school 9-13 and secondary 13-16/18. I preferred it as I hated secondary so was relieved I only did 3 years

flexi boarding is an amazing option.

Hardly depressing. He's going to be a king, he's known that from the minute he was capable of understanding.

Yes he'll do those things, but he'll have immense wealth, will never ever need to worry or even think about money, move in the highest social circles, have fantastic properties available to live in, be able to travel the world. He will have handed to him all the material privileges, multiplied many times over, that people wish for their children.

He can also do many of the things that he might want to do as hobbies. Fly a plane, do various sports, climb mountains, be an artist, write poetry, play the stock market, play any musical instrument.

Ok the country may lose in him a potentially brilliant surgeon or hugely inspiring teacher, but he'll be absolutely fine. He's been trained from birth for the life he'll lead.

There is a choice, it's a hard one but it's there and has been done already by Edward VIII.

😂😂😂😂😂😂

Totally agree - he will lead a life of unparalleled privilege and eye watering wealth. He can already see his parents spend most of their time on holiday. I wouldn’t feel too sorry for him 😀

So yours were flexi and were allowed to move at their own pace, and only boarded during the week, and only after they had made lots of friends. This is a different proposition from what's usually understood by boarding, which is where a child is some distance from home and only goes home in the holidays, and where contact with parents is discouraged for the first three weeks. Where they are dropped off not knowing anyone and just have to stick it out.

And that's bad enough for children who are 13. Don't get me started on early boarding. (Real boarding, not flexi boarding/weekly boarding like yours did.)

Let's face it, living at school is just weird. Was useful when parents were abroad during the Empire. But those days are over.

Coming from a state school, I also think it's pretty weird to pay to go to school, tbh.