James, Earl of Wessex collected his A-level results on Thursday morning and will go straight to the Royal Agricultural University to study Rural Land & Property Management. Buckingham Palace said the 18-year-old had achieved the grades he needed and would not take a year out before university.
James completed his Sixth Form studies at Radley College in Oxfordshire earlier this year. The palace statement tied the results-day update to his next step, making the move from school to university immediate rather than deferred.
Buckingham Palace statement
“Having achieved the grades he needed, The Earl of Wessex will be going to the Royal Agricultural University to study Rural Land & Property Management. He will head straight there without taking a year out,” Buckingham Palace said.
The university choice is notable because James is the first member of the British royal family to study at the Royal Agricultural University. Princess Anne's first husband, Captain Mark Phillips, studied there, and the institution is in Cirencester, nine miles from Princess Anne's home, Gatcombe Park.
Sandringham estate report
The results-day announcement also sits alongside a reported summer job at King Charles's Sandringham estate, where workers previously did a double-take after seeing James driving tractors on the farm. That reported work would place his university plans and farm experience on parallel tracks, but Buckingham Palace spoke only to his course and gap-year plans.
James has already appeared in public at several family events, including the Easter service at St George's Chapel in Windsor in April, Royal Ascot in June and Harriet and Peter Phillips's royal wedding in June. He also follows Lady Louise Windsor, who went straight to university after receiving her own grades in 2022 and graduated from the University of St Andrews in Scotland last month.
For James, the next step is fixed: results collected, course chosen, and university set without a break year in between. The open question is how the reported farm work at Sandringham estate will fit around that schedule.
