It has been a while since Crown Princess Victoria was still in school. It is, however, fascinating to take a look back at her education as it also prepared her for her future role of becoming the Queen of Sweden.
When she was five-years-old, she started attending pre-school at Västerled Parish Pre-school. She attended the nursery located in Bromma, Stockholm, for two years. Later, her younger brother and sister attended the same pre-school, as well.
In the autumn of 1984, she started to follow classes at Smedslättsskolan, also located in Bromma. It was there she completed her junior level. The next step in her education was to acquire an intermediate level which she achieved at the Ålstensskolan. Having attended public schools in the past, Victoria switched to private schools when she started secondary school studies.
Then the Crown Princess followed a more specialised Science and Social Studies programme at Enskilda Gymnasiet upper secondary school in Stockholm. Victoria graduated in June 1996. She celebrated her graduation with her classmates, pictured by the press. The famous pictures of the Crown Princess being driven by her father in an open Cabrio through the streets of Stockholm are from that day.
The summer holidays were not a complete vacation for the Crown Princess. As the future Queen of Sweden, being able to speak several languages is key, and she often spent her vacations going on foreign trips to, for example, Germany or the United States to gain more foreign language experience. As a result, those efforts have made it to where the Crown Princess is able to speak Swedish, English, German and French.
From 1996-1997, Crown Princess Victoria studied her first year abroad at the Centre International D’Études Françaises at the Université Catholique de L’Ouest in Angers, France. There Victoria studied French. Next, Crown Princess Victoria got to know more about how the Swedish Parliament (Riksdag) and the Swedish government work through a specially designed programme just for her.
It was then that it became clear that Crown Princess Victoria suffered from an eating disorder. The pressure was too much for her. In agreement with her parents, she decided to go study far away from Sweden to give her some space.
In 1998 she started her studies in Political Science and History at Yale University in the United States. In 2000, she completed her studies in conflict resolution and international peace-building. During her time in the US, Victoria also gained some working experience at the United Nations in New York and at the Swedish Embassy in Washington DC.
In the years that followed, Crown Princess Victoria followed various study programmes such as at the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, the offices of the Swedish government, etc. She has also done an internship with the Swedish Trade Council in Berlin and Paris. All of these activities were combined with the Crown Princess’s official engagements.
As the future Queen of Sweden, it is also important to have some military training. She completed basic military training with the Swedish Armed Forces. In 2004, she also studied at the Swedish National Defence College to learn more about international relations and conflict resolution.
During these years, Crown Princess Victoria travelled a lot to various countries to learn more about international aid work in Asia, to get insights into the Chinese community, among other things. In 2006, Victoria completed her last year of education and “Crown Princess training” as she followed the diplomatic programme at the Swedish Foreign Ministry.
It has definitely not been easy for Crown Princess Victoria to gain such an impressive list of completed programmes and training. Victoria suffers, just like her father and siblings, from dyslexia. She has said about this that she “cried and felt great frustration.” She had many troubles with reading as she reads very slow. Her mother, Queen Silvia, soon realised that Victoria also had dyslexia and started to help her with the issues that it caused.
“Fortunately, mom was aware,” Crown Princess Victoria said about her mother’s help. Crown Princess Victoria always had to work harder than her classmates to achieve the same results. She went to school earlier than her other friends and worked very hard to catch up.
However, all of her training and studying has been beneficial in her role as heir to the throne and will help her one day when she is the monarch.
