Prince George’s new school.

Eton has produced some brilliant actors - Dominic West, Hugh Laurie, Tom Hiddlestone, Eddie Redmayne - Not that George will need to tread the boards but drama 'ups' your confidence and trains your voice which he will need in the future.

I wish Prince George well at Eton school and hope he will be happy there. His school will have been chosen with great care and rightly so. He is a future monarch and as such his education is paramount !

I hope he is happy at his school.
I hope he does not become Prince of Wales during his time there.

I briefly taught at Eton many years ago (supply teaching post), and was impressed by the quality of my colleagues, which I don't suppose has deteriorated. In class, the boys were just like boys in any class. It is a good school. As for security, it must help those responsible for the royal family that it is so close to back-up at Windsor Castle, just down the road.

DamaskRose

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 to Merlotgran and Rosie51 for their sensible posts and 👎🏻 to paddyann for her typically nasty one! George will be well aware of his position and that not everyone likes him as will all those in public life.
I live near Gordonstoun and have friends who sent their children there when the state system let them down. I would have considered it for my children had they needed to go. It is a completely different school now than in the King’s day. Is it right for George? No, I don’t think so. At Eton he will be near his family and will be able to see them regularly and be taken out by them. His parents will have considered all possibilities before reaching this decision.
I hope George will be happy and will thrive there.

Great post DamaskRose. Says it all

paddyann54

Aren,t ALL schools supposed to be safe?
After Dunblane schools are secured from unwanted visitors doors locked and entry for everyone checked.
Maybe these royal children should see how the rest of us live and understand that they are not universally liked/loved .
That might stop the entitled behaviour of them as adults!
A good dose of reality can only be for their benefit

I doubt if any member of the Royal family for several generations, if ever, has considered themselves to be we universally liked/loved.

Considering the immense security they have to live under and the number of assassination attempts on Royalty of all nationalities, including the British, I think they are probably even more conscious than most of how ambivalent many people are to them.

A school being safe is not the same as a school being secure. Nobody can be blind to the number of stabbings there have been inside supposedly 'safe' schools. What are the chances that child would try and stab Prince George because it would make him famous. The security detail needed to keep the young Prince safe would inevitably come between him and any kind of normal school experience or building frienships.

Eton is a school attended by the sons of many wealthy people and royalty, who have serious security concerns around their children. It is a school with the necessary experience to enable Prince George to enjoy a normal education, where he is just one of many at a a school rather than one singled out one that has to be treated differently.

About 35 years ago my son entered a writing competition and the top 15 or so had the chance during the holidays to attended Eton for a fortnight to be tutored by some of the school’s
masters.
We took him on the first day and went with him to his single bedroom. I was horrified it was worse than a prison cell. The door was just a piece of jagged cloth, the bed looked like what you would find in a prison cell. We reluctantly left him there for a fortnight.
Two weeks later we collected him. He said he had had the time of his life, learned so much and it had been a great experience.
For the last 17 years he has been a children’s author in some way thanks to Eton.
I hope Prince George has an equally good experience.

Just what the average 13 year wants - a trad school uniform made up of a Victorian frock coat and stiff wing collar to match.

Still, it has to be a million miles better than recent proposals that school uniforms should get an update and pupils should be allowed to wear tracksuits.

Really? If they look like chavs the chances are they might start acting like chavs......

I hope that’s what he wants and he’s happy there. School days help to build a person. Mine nearly destroyed me.

I think both boys and girls do better academically studying in single sex schools. Our daughter was in one from 3-15 and loved it. Unfortunately, we had to move away and she really struggled in the mixed high school.

There’s more to life than academia ??

Now I’m very curious to know where Charlotte will go

My bet would be Marlborough.

Chocolatelovinggran

Historic data suggests that girls in single sex schools outperform their peers, and boys in single sex schools do less well than their peers in mixed schools.

I think this is not true if you are talking about "performance".

In the past there was a lot of raw data out there which suggested that was the truth but meta analysis shows it to be false.

So, for example, Single-sex girls' schools are mainly fee paying, selective, or located in wealthier areas. The girls come from more privileged homes in the first place and start at these schools with higher academic achievements

When you compare girls of the same socioeconomic background and prior ability, the academic differences between single-sex and mixed schools shrinks to nearly nothing.

A single-sex environment actually boosts performance (and order, and engagement) for lower-achieving, lower-income and ethnic minority boys.

Also boys in single sex schools are more likely to take subjects that were considered "girls" subjects such as modern languages.

Aside from "performance" though - students in coeducational schools have better communication skills and felt more socially prepared for the real world when they leave.

When girls' only Grammar schools were scholarship entry only the pupils came from a wide range of socio- economic backgrounds were responsible for true social mobility. Labour were responsible for the destruction of grammar school education available to all. Mine still remains single -sex scholarship only and continues to outstrip the boys' Grammar, now reduced to fee-paying.
Living in a different part of the country now the comprehensives here do well according to their catchment area, but they are far too large and have such a wide range of pupils' needs to cater for.

I think it would be best if the school were mixed but the classes single sex. That way they could concentrate in class but mix with others of the opposite sex during breaks. Why has this never been tried? I think it would work.

Of the many schools near us, 4 are selective. 3 single-sex and one co-ed.
3 out of 4 do better academically than the remaining schools, and 2 of the single sex schools do better in terms of academic results than the co-eds.

^ Aside from "performance" though - students in coeducational schools have better communication skills and felt more socially prepared for the real world when they leave.^

Certainly that’s what AI still says, but it surely depends on each individual child.

The children who, outside school hours, participate in mixed sex activities like navy cadets, or mixed-sex sports, or even those I see meeting up in town after school, whilst still in school uniform from don't seem to lack communication skills or the ability to mix.

IMO "prepared for the real world" means having the practical skills, emotional resilience, and financial independence necessary to navigate adulthood. It transitions someone from a sheltered, theory-based environment—like school—into a self-sufficient lifestyle where actions have immediate consequences.

I’m not sure any school, single-sex or co-ed does that very well in today’s world.

Padstow13

Just what the average 13 year wants - a trad school uniform made up of a Victorian frock coat and stiff wing collar to match.

Still, it has to be a million miles better than recent proposals that school uniforms should get an update and pupils should be allowed to wear tracksuits.

Really? If they look like chavs the chances are they might start acting like chavs......

The wing collars at Eton are only worn by the seniors.

So Prince George won't be wearing one for some time to come. And I doubt he'll lose much sleep about his uniform, he knows what Eton is all about, his Father went there and he's lived in the area for long enough, so he'll be used to seeing the uniform.

At least he wasn’t sent to Gordonstoun like his poor grandfather. Charles hated it and must have thought his parents hated him at times .
I think Prince George should be given a voice .

ferry23

Padstow13

Just what the average 13 year wants - a trad school uniform made up of a Victorian frock coat and stiff wing collar to match.

Still, it has to be a million miles better than recent proposals that school uniforms should get an update and pupils should be allowed to wear tracksuits.

Really? If they look like chavs the chances are they might start acting like chavs......

The wing collars at Eton are only worn by the seniors.

So Prince George won't be wearing one for some time to come. And I doubt he'll lose much sleep about his uniform, he knows what Eton is all about, his Father went there and he's lived in the area for long enough, so he'll be used to seeing the uniform.

Could be worse.
My DH wore a dress!

MartavTaurus

Thanks for the picture. Your DH looks good in a dress. I see he has the obligatory yellow socks too.
I’ll bet his parents were proud that he wore it.

NotSpaghetti, my knowledge, which I acknowledge will be out of date, now, twelve years into retirement, refers to the county of my schooling, and a large part of my teaching career, Kent.
Kent has a selective secondary system, and had, and continues to have, single sex grammar schools.
The selection criteria for both boys and girls was not based on the pupil's neighborhood, nor the ability of the parents to pay fees, but on a series of tests .
There was, of course, some manipulation to ensure that the number of successful boys equalled the number of successful girls, but that would certainly be a subject for a different thread!

This is really my point.
The single sex grammar schools were selective.

The meta analysis and more recent work shows that if other factors are considered there is almost no difference.

I always thought there would be.
It's like the more recent studies about girls and STEM subjects. More do take them and some to A level but the tendency is that these girls do other things on the whole at university (I think it was Economics).

What most studies do find though is that the young people leaving education feel better equipped if they were educated in mixed sex environments.

When I've got a minute I'll see if I can find the papers.

The global educational consensus suggests that school quality, teaching standards, and student background dictate academic success far more than whether the classrooms are mixed or separated.

Studies measuring "mental toughness" show that girls in single-sex environments often report higher levels of emotional control, body confidence, and a greater willingness to participate in competitive sports without the fear of negative judgment.

Although the opposite does not appear to be true in boys’ schools, girls at single-sex schools are nearly three times more likely to study further maths and over twice as likely to take physics compared to their co-ed peers.

Analysis shows that the credence given to, or acceptance of, any of this data depends on which type of schooling is being promoted.

Reading the various reports, it would seem that single sex schools benefit girls more than boys.
Is that a valid reason for promoting co-ed?

I can never understand why people get so worked up about single sex schools and the social effects.

A child, let us say a girl, at a single sex school, may have brothers, her friends will have brothers, she will do out of school activities in a co-ed situation. There will be male relations around.

i went to a convent boarding school and had no brothers, but friends did and, my father being in the army, there were plenty of dishy young subalterns around in the holidays.

When I went to university I was far more confident in male company than many of my friends who had been at co-ed schools.

M0nica

When I went to university I was far more confident in male company than many of my friends who had been at co-ed schools.

Possibly because you hadn’t suffered the treatment some boys dished out to girls back then (and now, for all I know).