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LONDON – Prince George, 13, is about to start at his new school, Eton College.
The future king will have his own room inside a small boarding house that holds around 55 pupils, according to Eton’s official website.
George is following in the footsteps of father Prince William and uncle Prince Harry, who also attended the boarding school for boys. Eton costs around $84,400 per year and will be George’s educational home until he turns 18.
Here’s what William and Harry have said about their time at Eton.
Prince William, 1995- 2000
Prince William enrolled at Eton in September 1995. The future king, 44, rarely talks about his time away at Eton, unlike brother Prince Harry.
Photos taken on William’s first day of school show him smiling as he is escorted by his parents, King Charles who was then Prince of Wales, and Princess Diana into the building, along with Harry who would start at the school three years later.
While William has never delved into much detail about his Eton years, his decision to send his oldest child, Prince George, to the prestigious school is an endorsement that speaks volumes. His choice regarding George’s education is a clear indication that he believes the school is the best place to educate the future monarch and positively shape his teenage years.
In 2000, as he turned 18 and prepared to leave the school, William told the Press Association that he “enjoyed Eton very much” and said he would would miss the friends he made there.
In the same interview, he said press attention made him “uncomfortable” but that the media had left him alone while he studied at Eton, which he was “grateful” for.
Prince Harry, 1998 – 2003
Prince Harry began his schooling at Eton a year after the death of his mother, Princess Diana.
In his memoir, “Spare,” Harry recalled starting at Eton in September 1998 as “a profound shock” and said he felt “completely overwhelmed.”
Harry grappled with much at the school, including the new glossary of slang used among the boys, French lessons, being forced to act in plays, making friends and working out how to put on the school’s formal uniform.
While older brother William had already been at the school for three years, Harry wrote that his sibling was not a source of reassurance or warmth as he embarked on his journey there. In fact, William asked Harry to “pretend” he “didn’t know him,” the memoir alleges.
“Willy always hated it when anyone made the mistake of thinking us a package deal,” Harry wrote, adding that his brother was too busy “forging his own life” at Eton and “he wasn’t willing to give that up.”
While at Eton, the prince said he went from smoking cigarettes to marijuana.
In “Spare,” Harry wrote that one night, while smoking weed in the bathroom with some fellow pupils, he looked out of the window and noticed police officers patrolling the school grounds by moonlight. The officers were there because of him, he wrote, adding that while stationed at Eton for his royal security, they made him feel “caged.”
That same evening, while high on pot, the prince wrote that he noticed a fox outside. The animal, he said, gazed directly at him, sparking “a kinship.”
“I felt more connected to that fox than I did to the boys in the bathroom, the other boys at Eton,” he wrote, though he later credited rugby with helping him make close friends who were more on his wavelength.
“Sport I decided would be my thing at Eton,” Harry wrote.
In a June interview with TIME, Harry again cited sports as a haven, especially during his school years.
“Sport held me together,” he said. “I was one of those kids at school who did not enjoy classroom work. If it wasn’t for the sports field, and the amount of sports that were on offer, there’s no way I would have stayed in school.”
Before he could graduate in 2003, Harry wrote that he was forced to take part in the school production, adding that “theatre was deadly serious at Eton” and that if he wanted to leave, he had to act.
When he graduated from Eton in 2003, Harry wrote that he didn’t feel pride because he didn’t “know how to be proud” of himself. He noted, however, that finishing his studies at the school did provide “a distinct pause” in his “nonstop internal self-criticism.”