It was the easiest thing to predict: of course the Windsors will be a flurry of activity and public appearances over the next few weeks. They’ve timed everything around the Invictus Games, which start on February 8th in Vancouver and Whistler. Prince William and Kate were practically wailing “PAY ATTENTION TO MEEEEE” during the Dusseldorf games in 2023, and William organized a bunch of completely random “events” in an attempt to steal Harry’s thunder. This time, it looks like Kate is being sent out in a big way – she’s launching yet another Early Years busywork program or something. The way it’s being written about, I can’t even tell what is being launched or how it’s different than her other busywork “launches.” It’s Project Kate Is Keen About Early Years.
The Princess of Wales has launched a new initiative aimed at developing the nation’s “social and emotional skills” to alleviate the human cost from a world sometimes filled with “mistrust and misunderstanding”.
Kate said the state of modern life was leaving many feeling “isolated and vulnerable” during troubled periods, resulting in “poor mental health, addiction and abuse” that was “devastating” for those affected and society.
The solution is to “develop and nurture” the social and emotional skills we all possess from the moment we are born which are the “bedrock of any healthy, happy society”, but this must be a priority if we are to “thrive”.
Kate’s Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood has published the Shaping Us Framework aimed at increasing awareness of these soft or life skills to inspire action across society. The future Queen said in her foreword for a report outlining the framework: “Modern society is complex. At times, it can feel like the world is filled with mistrust and misunderstanding, leaving many people feeling isolated and vulnerable during difficult times. The impact of this, poor mental health, addiction and abuse, can be devastating, for individuals and for society.”
“If we are to address this properly, if we are to find real, lasting solutions to these deep-rooted challenges and create a physically and mentally healthier society, we must reset, restore, and rebalance. We must invest in humankind.”
People Magazine noted, “In the coming days, Kate will be out and about promoting a new part of her campaign, underlining how she is gradually getting back into her stride with her public work after a year spent largely out of the public eye.” At some point, I do hope someone questions why the Windsors behave like jealous, attention-seeking children whenever they know Harry and Meghan will be out in public.
As for Kate’s appearances, they will be used to promote – I think? – yet another awareness-raising campaign, because Kate’s Early Years & Buttons Institute continues to poll people about their “awareness” of the importance of Early Years. It’s a tremendous waste of time, money and effort, as always. But at least Kate gets to make pronouncements like “Modern society is complex” and “We must invest in humankind.” Anything more specific than that? Which investments should be made, Kate? Universal Pre-K, government funded child-development programs like Head Start? Kate will never get that specific, not when she could “raise awareness” of the importance of the Early Years and present her book report during the Invictus Games. “The early years are important because they’re early, most people don’t know how early or how important, the world is so complex and we must invest in children!”
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
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- WINDSOR, ENGLAND – JUNE 06: Catherine, Princess of Wales spends time with a group accessing the early years set of services during a visit to the Windsor Family Hub on June 06, 2023 in Windsor, England. The Windsor Family Hub is run by Achieving for Children, a not-for-profit community interest company providing children’s services for the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead. The Princess has dedicated her time to raising awareness of the critical importance of early childhood and in January 2023, with The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, launched Shaping Us, a campaign which aims to transform the issue of early childhood, from one of scientific interest to one of the most strategically important topics of our time.,Image: 781760572, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Chris Jackson / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales visits the Design Museum where she made a key note speech at the “Shaping Us” National Symposium in London, UK, 15 November 2023,Image: 822201109, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Richard Pohle / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales visits the Design Museum where she made a key note speech at the “Shaping Us” National Symposium in London, UK, 15 November 2023,Image: 822201133, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Richard Pohle / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales visits the Design Museum where she made a key note speech at the “Shaping Us” National Symposium in London, UK, 15 November 2023,Image: 822201197, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Richard Pohle / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales laughs as she listens to Tony Blair and William Hague swap anecdotes as they speak at the “Shaping Us” National Symposium at the Design Museum in London, UK, 15 November 2023,Image: 822228587, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Richard Pohle / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales laughs as she listens to Tony Blair and William Hague swap anecdotes as they speak at the “Shaping Us” National Symposium at the Design Museum in London, UK, 15 November 2023,Image: 822228646, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Richard Pohle / Avalon
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales in Kirkgate Market in Leeds, West Yorkshire, where she is meeting vendors and members of the public for the launch of the Shaping Us campaign which is raising awareness of the unique importance of early childhood. Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales Where: Leeds, England, United Kingdom When: 31 Jan 2023 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images **North America Rights Only**
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales hosts the inaugural meeting of her new Business Taskforce for Early Childhood at NatWest’s headquarters in the City of London where they will discuss why Early Childhood is so critical for business. Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales Where: London, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2023 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Catherine, Princess of Wales hosts the inaugural meeting of her new Business Taskforce for Early Childhood at NatWest’s headquarters in the City of London where they will discuss why Early Childhood is so critical for business. Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales Where: London, United Kingdom When: 21 Mar 2023 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
Urgh, so over this! Such a complete waste of time. What angers me about this is that both Will and Kate’s appearances are not even genuine. Sure they attend these causes but really with the sole intention of competing with Harry and Meghan. Pathetic! We can see right through the both of you!
Anyway, can’t wait for the invictus games and Meghan’s new show!
🙄 – that is all I’ve got. That is all it merits. She and William are such let downs. Huge underachievers.
Great, Operation “It’s not about the clothes, it’s all about the work” has just begun! So, please show all of the Early Years data since Kate’s involvement began so we can track the improvements. Let’s see if she needs to do better in her existing work or if she merits starting another Early Years initiative.
Also, he hasn’t been mentioned, but I’m all agog to see hard data on William’s work in mental health, homelessness, the environment, and the Middle East peace process. Whoops, I forgot William is also eliminating hunger!
Time for transparency on what these two have accomplished up to now, how often they work, and their coming goals.
You forgot racism. He’s ending racism!
*smacks forehead* How could I forget racism??!
*reads about Invictus and Meghan’s Netflix and remembers how W treated his own family and where they now live* Oh yeah, that’s why☹️
I thought he already ended racism? Or was that just in soccer/football?
Agreeing with @ML – time for a hard update please on her projects’ tangible achievements. Tangible achievements.
And the same for William. I think it’s a reasonable request.
The results and impact of Kate’s initiative are going to be announced at the same time as those of Melania’s ‘Be Best’ campaign. A breathless world awaits the announcements. And I am desperate to know what ground breaking work ‘pro-choice’ Mel is going to do in the next four years.
Launch launch launch. It’s all she knows. She launches and then nothing happens until a fake pie chart and picture is needed to look busy.
She’s a lady who launches?
No, that actually sounds too substantial
She doesn’t even have any friends to lunch with, much less anything to launch. I would feel sorry for her, if she wasn’t a truly terrible person. She is such a waste of a truly great platform.
What Christine said ^^
Failure to Launch? Wasn’t that a film awhile back?
Truly is a sad sad thing especially when there are so many bits in the UK that need attention.
I’m just going to laugh from now on when I hear this. She doesn’t “launch” anything and she never has, ever. So here’s my laugh: LOLOLOLOL!!
She has a ghost writer for those blurbs IMO. She had time while waiting for a proposal to get a degree in it which would have lent a small amount of credibility.
Meanwhile her sister Pippa… actually did.
The jokes write themselves. Kate should ask her sister for some Pippa Tips
Pip’s thing is little more than a cheap certificate from watching a bunch of online videos. You can call it an MA, but there’s nothing rigorous about it. Her ‘research’ was a silly survey just like Keen’s, ‘are physical activities important to young children’ uselessness.
IMO pip did that so Keen could hire her. Middletons have been trying to get her on the royal payroll from the start, but QEII refused to let her be a lady in waiting for Keen. The nutrition education stunt years ago, the party planning flopping, this ‘little kids going outside is important’ certificate which ties into Kate’s ‘arly years, silly garden flop, and latching onto forest breathing. All aimed at an excuse to throw a salary at little sis.
I was going to comment on this in the post about Kate’s clothes. Yesterday, I read a tabloid article which was supposed to be about Kate’s Stunning Announcement. The first paragraph was all about the purple pantsuit she wore, what the color meant, when she’d worn it before, her shoes, her bag, her jewelry, her bouncy hair. The next paragraph was about a similar red pantsuit she’d worn some other time for some other reason, the color, the jewelry, etc. On and on for paragraphs, all about her clothes.
At the very end, they finally got around to reporting that she was announcing that sometime in the future she would be launching something, something, Arly Yahs, something, blah, blah, something, initiative.
But that has been Kate’s playbook since forever: announcing an announcement where an announcement will be made.
She doesn’t do substance and never has.
What I don’t get though: KP has had the chance for a thorough re-start, as FakeyKatie has been shunning work, whatever that means to her, for more than a year — and this is all they came up with?
The best idea for them: donate all that money that’s already been wasted on Airrly Yarrs to a legitimate initiative. Kate hasn’t achieved anything other than being deservedly mocked for her cluelessness and general Middletonedeafness.
KP has the problem of silk purse/sow’s ear. The Royal Foundation spent over 2 million pounds setting up the Centre for Early Childhood Education and there have been years of PR about how this is Kate’s flagship issue, so it’s not like they can just drop it now and switch to Kate saving the leatherback turtles. Sadly, Kate’s the only Princess of Wales they’ve got.
Eurydice, 2 million?? I hope it was spent on salaries for those in the broom closet making the fake pie charts and the blurbs for their website. I’m sure the claymation video wasn’t cheap, but 2 million OMG.
@Smart&Messy – I got the figures off the foundation’s 2023 financial report. There’s no specific breakdown for the Centre itself, but there’s a separate section for foundation salaries and overhead – it might be double counting, I don’t know.
It’s not a big foundation, about 7 million in assets – and it seems most of the expenditures were for setting up things, like the Centre, and 2.2 million to set up Homewards, and about 3.5 million for salaries. I see only about half a million in grants, 50 thousand of which was for Kate’s initiative.
@Eurydice – have mentioned this before, but may as well throw it out there once again. Have you looked at the staff structure on the foundation webpage?
The CEO is Amanda Berry, formerly CEO of Bafta. You can be sure she’s not cheap. There is a Chief of Staff position. Then there are four Executive Director positions. And then, five other Director level position. That’s 9 director level positions in addition to a chief of staff and the CEO. And that’s not counting the lower level staff who must provide support services. Can you tell what they’re doing that’s even marginally worthwhile besides spending money for salaries?
On top of that, there’s nine trustees, two of whom have additional positions with the Wales directly.
With that kind of structure, I’d expect the foundation to be 1) a much larger organization; and 2) doing marvelous things that we hear about frequently.
They do have a nice website though, whoever was responsible for that…
Your summary is hilarious! And spot on! 🤣
Please no more of Kath posting as an “expert.”. Kate at least get real experts to come and speak. Maybe sponsor a conference. Give credit where it’s due. She has no degree in early childhood, just art history.
I read a BBC post about this, and an actual expert who lent his name to this bullshit did point out that funding existing programs like nurses doing home visits and access to Family Hubs would mean a lot. The Family Hubs was capitalized, so I assume it’s a program for families with small children. If Kate doesn’t want to campaign for the govt funding of these programs, she could work her ass off raising funds herself. She could actually give it to them instead of the Royal Foundation which would skim it for operations, and then the RF would give some of it to an umbrella foundation which would skim some more of it, and finally, the Family Hub would get like 10 thousand a year or something. But no, this expert’s remark would be buried in the announcement of the announcement of a launch.
They are really refusing to let it go. All she does on this (and any other, actually) topic means nothing. Word salads and fancy words.
On the other hand, I love to see how much “work” they have planned for Meghan’s show launch, and all for nothing😀 they must be livid. Wonder if they will try to repeat the effort for next planned launch or just give up?
is this an indirect copy of H&M’s work on social media and its effects? without mentioning social media, saying the modern world is complex blah blah we must invest in humankind?? WTF?
Yes it certainly is. I looked at the phrasing and words used and immediately made the connection to H+M’s work on social media and mental health. If she launches a “Parents’ Network” I’ll laugh out loud.
Her early years initiatives remind me of how Melania copied everything Michelle Obama did as First Lady by doing her grammatical incorrect “Do Best” lololol. Copying word for word, fonts and colors. Creating a pamphlet that was the exact same with minimal changes and passing it as their own, and still failing to accomplish anything. Kate is the UK Melania in every way. They speak and you can’t understand them. They are mediocre at best in anything they do. They copy and paste the more attractive, intelligent and accomplished women of color who have the same titles or positions. They’ve revealed more of themselves than any of us should ever have to see. They are carbon copies of each other while trying to copy two women they could never hold a candle to.
The funny thing is these delusional idiots think that this crap really competes with the Sussex’s or steals any thunder 🤣🤪..
Just why? There is so much poverty right now, and all this is going to do is make people feel even worse that they are missing out on their children’s important milestones as they are struggling to put food on the table. And what recommendations have come out of her millions’ worth of research so far?
In 1850, one in four children in the UK lived in poverty. Today one in four children in the UK lives in poverty.
The annual billion wasted on the royals could be put to much better use. Or rather, put to any use at all as the Windsors are useless.
OR maybe another claymation production
No. Just no.
What has this claymation actually accomplished? There were so much noise around it and its cost was rather extravagant….
Yes, thank you, the modern world is indeed complex. Aaaand? Oh right, the early years are important. Got it.
Don’t worry, @Jais! Kate is here to save the day!
We have data that shows how many (under five) children are starting school unprepared, like not being toilet trained, being unable to navigate stairs and showing other signs that they have not had the development they need by this point. The data suggests being ‘covid babies’ plays a role but also parents being stretched too thinly (cost of living crisis) and not spending the time interacting with them and supporting their development.
How about you DO something about any aspect of this? Spend some of the £££££ your ‘foundation’ collects to make a positive impact in some of these children’s lives. It’s so frustrating I want to weep. But hey, talk about the ‘work’ not the clothes.
#abolishthemonarchy
SarahCS, In the EU, the effect on UK kids was blamed on Brexit, not Covid? The Early childhood workforce had a significant number of EU workers who were forced to leave by 2020.
https://www.cypnow.co.uk/content/analysis/childcare-feels-the-brexit-effect
It wasn’t mentioned in the reporting on the study that just came out, the focus was on kids experiences at home, but I’m sure the loss of workers also had an huge impact.
Thanks for responding, SarahCS. I haven’t been paying close attention to the news, but you meant this: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jan/30/some-children-starting-school-unable-to-climb-staircase-finds-england-and-wales-teacher-survey
Tbh, most kids need to go into daycare or nursery school or similar set up where I am: I’m honestly surprised that working parents have gotten the blame. Covid lockdowns were not the kids’ entire lives. Clearly it sounds like massive neglect, but depressingly widespread. You can’t leave small children alone while you work–where are they before reception? Plus, everyone was urged to get outside and walk?
For what it’s worth, Wikipedia’s UK lockdown info: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_lockdown_in_the_United_Kingdom
Small kids were able to gather quicker than some other groups.
This is shocking: Kate should (better) do something to fight this!
Is KP trying to relaunch our Kate as a serious, substantial woman by ordering RR to focus on her, ahem, projects rather than clothes and jewels? What is her role now and going forward; hardworking ,showing up well prepared, asking sensible questions and making an effort to promote her charities ? Previously she and his nibs have treated their limited events as jollies like school trips. Professionals look on indulgently whilst Kate and William go down slides or pretend to prepare food or sit on motorbikes going vroom, vroom. It all seems like a waste of time ,entertaining these two adult toddlers , just to provide PR for the RF? Neither have gravitas but they must be seen in public carrying out royal duties. The big ceremonial occasions with the entire family are very rigidly structured but their own events seem to be just them having a lot of fun at our expense such as Wimbledon and football matches?
“These two adult toddlers” captures W&K perfectly. As they head toward 50 one wonders when – when – are they going to fledge?!
The real experts are just wasting their time talking to her.
You first Kate! You apologize, publicly, to your brother and sister-in-law for the harm your silence and complicity wrought. Take ownership for your behavior, for your lack of compassion and honesty, as Meghan suffered due to the lies being told on your behalf. As the saying goes “be the change you want to see in the world”.
Oh, goody! Another pie chart!
I was just thinking I can’t wait to see the new pie charts! Maybe she’ll surprise us and give us a bar graph!
Wow that will be ever so exciting. I can’t wait.
Melanie Griffith in the film working girl said she needed a serious hairdo. Kate needs a serious hairdo instead of that long hair that looks sloppy . Like in the photo of her at the microphone
Oh great, Keen gets to dress up as a business woman again. And she will mumble and mutter and wave her hands. Such a help to the community.
I’m interested to hear from an expert in children’s early years development, who can provide insight into the impact and effectiveness of this woman’s Early Years initiative. Specifically, I’d like to know their perspective on why, despite her prominence, there has been little to no progress in advancing this initiative, and why she isn’t held more accountable for the lack of tangible results.
Where is the progress? Where are the results?
1. You will get no ‘on the record’ response from any UK professional in the field. They dare not. And they dont have the balls to contradict their masters in palaces.
2. There has been “little to no progress in advancing this initiative” because that is NOT the goal.
3. She will not be held accountable because thats not a word thats recognized by the british monarchy.
Heres the thing: the monarchy has historically been more about maintaining power and appearances than helping the people. Over these 1000 yrs, theyve only ever exercised themselves to APPEAR to the plebs and their critics that theyre “modernising” by MIMICKING that concept.
I thought I had read that after Kate’s trip to Denmark, she brought back to the UK a study of some kind of baby monitor that was successfully helping to determine preventative actions to help infant and toddler development, and that this current launch is a mere extension of this study. It does seem that Kate is always “launching” simply because she has been the such a failure to launch. It’s like hitting the re-set button to start over again constantly because she just can’t seem make any progress ever. However, in order to make progress, you need to have clearer goals in mind. If awareness is the only goal, then she could just do a survey every few years and hope that the number of people “aware” keeps growing. What to do with the “awareness” is the problem that someone like Kate and KP cannot solve because it means creating specific policies and implementing them with proper funding.
The problem for the british monarchy and their hopeless, pathetic efforts to make fetch happen regarding the 2 duds they have as king&queen-in-waiting, is that, as a result of their desperation to outdo H&M, they seem to feel compelled to describe their make-work for the 2 duds in grandiose, superlative terms. As if they need to assert their royal creds. You can see that they feel pompously justified in doing this.
And this kind of approach by anyone to anything, inevitably puts them on the backfoot…….theres pressure to live up to the promised high expectations. And if the material youre working with (bully & kitty) are nonstarters, then the project will be (& have been) DOA.
Heres their deeply resented, uphill task, as far as I see it: by natural selection…..a twist of fate…….destiny……whatever we may call it, H&M have always had effortless global appeal. From the minute their relationship became public, interest in the couple has been global……we’ve all seen that the world is fascinated by them for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which and in fact, perhaps the most significant of which is the universality of their innate appeal to the ideals we all hold most dear, both as individuals: (freedom, perseverance, happiness, love, autonomy, fulfillment, respect, dignity); and as a species: (survival; justice; peace; truth; love; compassion and community.)
H&M are imbued with all the above. And bully and kitty are not.
Hence all the jealousy, resentment, anger, bitterness, sabotage, and pursuit of destruction.
Theyve tried co-opting & colonizing their work, their personae, their image, their essence (back in 2019 someone on twitter who told #SSquad that she was doing research for a college paper to find out what it was about M that made her fans love her so much, was outed as a KP intern); and after failing to capture the je ne sais quoi of H&M in order to clothe bully & kitty with it, theyve resorted to trying to pre-emptively destroy their work and their relationship.
This will not last long. The poor sausages will be exhausted by day 3. How can you go from zero to no work all year to suddenly be expected to work daily . I give them 4 days before they need two months off 😄😄. Last time these two did this much they took the year off. Yeah I know cancer. Sure Jan.
Didn’t we JUST hear last week that she would not be “rushing” back to work?
Yawn.
Wow, they’re still going ahead with this nonsense? Let’s hope Kate doesn’t stress another hernia, working her poor mittens to the bone with pie charts galore.
I thought this Shaping Us framework thing happened last year? Are all these quotes from last year?
Who has written all this so Kathy can seem highly intelligent all of a sudden?
She is no academic and never will be.
The text doesn’t seem as written by someone highly intelligent..it’s more platitudes …perhaps written by AI?
There are very good programmes around the world to promote the mental and physical health of young children. The problem with all these programmes is the poverty of many families who are not able to take care of their own health and that of their children with poorly paid work. The next problem is the lack of good educational childcare places and really good financial support for families in the first year of their children’s lives. There is so much to say about this. Kate mentions something that needs conditions that don’t exist in her country. There is so much child poverty and there are so many existing programmes that just need more money, more donations. She could just support them without this attention-grabbing project that just states the obvious without doing anything.