The People’s Prince was in full flight on Monday. Prince Harry flew into Vancouver over the weekend and popped up at the Grey Cup on Sunday. Then on Monday, he made a “surprise” stop at the Seaforth Academy to hang out with the students there and introduce them to the Invictus Games and everything in and around Invictus. Most of the students are from military families, I think? And the photos show a man full of charm who loves to be around kids. He’s listening to them, engaging with them. He’s absolutely not wandering around like Lurch, pointing a gnarled finger at them while performatively grimacing. Not that I’m making any specific reference.
On Nov. 18, the Duke of Sussex, 40, appeared at the Seaforth Armoury in Vancouver to launch the School Program from the Invictus Games Vancouver Whistler 2025, presented by ATCO and Boeing. Prince Harry, a former captain in the British Army, created the Invictus Games, an international adaptive sports tournament for wounded, injured and sick service personnel and veterans, in 2014 as a means for healing, and the next iteration will be held in Vancouver and Whistler in February of next year.
Prince Harry visited the historic military facility to join students in a range of activities, marking the launch of an online program aimed at introducing the Invictus Games to schools everywhere. As a father to two young children — Prince Archie, 5 and Princess Lilibet, 3 — Harry’s natural parenting skills were on full display as he interacted with the kids.
“Seeing them learn about the Invictus Games has had a profound impact on me because this is where Invictus starts to go even wider outside of the Invictus community, into schools in Canada and hopefully around the world,” Prince Harry said in a speech shared to X. The visit comes 81 days before the next cycle of the Invictus Games begins.
I adore Harry and everything, but I have some questions: are they developing an Invictus-type program for schools and if so, why? While the Invictus Games always feature family-friendly, kid-friendly interactive events, is the idea to really create something like an Invictus course or an Invictus program for all schools, or just military schools? While I think it’s really cool that he did this (visited a school full of military kids), I just think it’s kind of a difficult sell to take this wider? Especially when Invictus has been needing to grow itself – the number of applications rises significantly each year, and they’ve needed to expand how many competitors they bring in for a while.
Photos courtesy of Getty.