‘Our success is founded on our inclusive and supportive school culture’

How The Crypt School guides its students to academic excellence

From its ‘teach to the top’ approach in the classroom, to its network of academic and pastoral support structures outside of it, SoGlos sits down with the head of The Crypt School in Gloucester, Nick Dyer, to find out how the school helps its students to flourish academically, with a view to each student getting the best possible start onto their chosen career pathway.

By Jake Chown  |  Published Friday 15 May 2026

In partnership with The Crypt School | cryptschool.org

The Crypt School is a co-educational grammar school in Gloucester, which welcomes students aged 11 to 18. It has an excellent academic reputation, an impressive extra-curricular programme and an environment of strong pastoral care to help its students achieve their full potential.

With an approach that puts emphasis on encouraging students to use their newly acquired knowledge to answer challenging questions, The Crypt School in Gloucester has an excellent record of guiding its young people to academic success.

SoGlos talks with the school’s head, Nick Dyer, about how the school helps students to thrive in their studies, from its approach inside the classroom, to extra support outside of it, and how it helps to prepare students for their future careers in an ever-changing landscape.

Tell us about The Crypt School’s academic record.

As a selective grammar school, students come to us with high academic ability to begin with. That’s, of course, a strong advantage in terms of their potential to succeed in their learning journeys; however, as a school we’ve got to work hard to make sure that they do indeed make that exceptional progress that they are capable of across the full range of academic subjects that they study. 

Over recent years, the attainment of our groups in their GCSEs and other exams has further strengthened. For example, outcomes in modern foreign languages have improved significantly, and the school is now one of the best performing schools regionally in those subjects at GCSE.

Science and mathematics have always been great strengths of the school, but we also see students do extremely well in the humanities – history, geography and religious education – and in the creative arts – music, drama and art, for example. Many of our students also excel in and enjoy studying computing, English and more practical subjects such as sports science and food technology. 

We’re fortunate to have very able students at the school, but we work hard to enable them to achieve ‘value added’ in the progress they make over the course of their studies with us.

What approach does the school take to supporting students to succeed academically, in the classroom?

We have very clear expectations of what our student’s learning is going to look like, in terms of the curriculum, but also of what we want them to achieve at key ‘end points’ across the year.

Our approach is to teach to the top, setting high academic expectations for all of our learners to aspire to. However, we provide extra support to those who find the work more challenging at times, which is really important, but we also take away that ‘scaffolding’ over time, enabling students to reach those high grades and make excellent progress in their work. 

We put a lot of focus on questioning – not accepting the first answer given, but asking the students to dig deeper, to think more critically, with skilled teachers bouncing students’ ideas around the room to involve a wider group.

Ultimately, we want to equip our students with the knowledge they need to answer challenging questions, and to ultimately make evidence based judgments of their own. We do have a knowledge rich curriculum here at The Crypt School, but one that seeks to place critical thinking and the development of skills such as oracy at its centre. 

We also want our students to increasingly become independent learners – but students do need to learn how to become more independent in both their work and learning. We have a strong focus on students all developing a growing sense of personal ownership of their progress, and of their work, and that is also a key feature of our sixth form curriculum and approach to learning: that’s about preparing our senior students for university study and the world of work, where they will have to operate independently.

We have a strong and deep rooted culture of celebrating and valuing each student’s progress and achievement here at Crypt which shapes our learning environment; with able and committed learners, and expert subject specialists, supported by a talented team of professional support staff, it’s no surprise our students really excel in their learning.

And of course, those students who have special educational needs are given the support and encouragement they need to excel in their learning and progress, too.

What does that extra support look like for students?

We offer a lot of academic support outside of lessons at lunchtime and after school, particularly in the form of revision sessions for exam students.

We might also identify that a student has challenges with handwriting, there might be students whose literacy skills aren’t as good as we would hope, for example, and they would be identified for extra support. 

Beyond academic support, we also have an outstanding pastoral system here at the school. Students can find the challenge of their school work quite hard, and they need that extra support from a wellbeing perspective.

I think the success that we have as the school is founded on the care that we offer to students, built around our inclusive and kind culture. Whether it’s our counsellors, pastoral support workers, tutors or heads of year, the students know that if they are facing challenges – be they academic or pastoral – there’s someone they can go to for support and guidance. That’s really important and I think it’s something the students really appreciate.

How does The Crypt support students to pursue their desired career pathways post-school, whether that’s university, an apprenticeship, or full-time employment?

The careers landscape is ever changing, isn’t it? It’s challenging for us to know what that landscape is going to look like for the current Year 7, for example, when they go into the workforce in seven to 10 years’ time. 

However, we do have a very thorough careers education guidance programme, that begins in Year 7 and strengthens through to the sixth form. That includes work experience in Year 10 and Year 12; lots of employer engagement activities; an annual careers fair; and we also have an independent careers advisor. All of that is led by our careers leader, who has a full network of contacts drawn from our parental body, our Old Cryptian network and others who want to give up some of their time to support our programme.

We don’t just concentrate on university – 75 per cent of our Year 13s will go to university, but there’s a significant group who are actively seeking apprenticeships and degree apprenticeship opportunities. Over the last few years, we’ve increased our support for those who want to look at apprenticeships, running workshops and replicating employer-led assessment days. There’s plenty of support for writing UCAS applications, CVs, or application letters, too.

Our main aim in the lower years is to give students an idea of the kind of careers that might be available to them, both now and in the future. We utilise labour market information, using a platform where students can record their personal achievements on, but also use it to research what careers are out there, how many jobs are available in the Gloucestershire area, what are the salary expectations and what skills and qualifications they would need to access that kind of career pathway.

What’s really fundamental, too, is the skills and personal qualities that each student is able to develop over their education at the school. If you can communicate well, that will always be something in demand. If you are resilient, there will always be challenges that you will face and can overcome. So, while knowledge and qualifications remain important, alongside that, our young people need those ‘softer’ skills that employers look for.

We know that our careers guidance programme is exceptional – that is what Ofsted said when they inspected the school in March 2024. We have also just had an external audit of our career programme by a company called Careers Mark – we gained their Careers Mark Award three years ago, and we’re aiming to have our programme re-accredited this month. 

Of course, the labour market is in a time of great change: technology and AI in particular are reshaping how people work, and where they work. It is also going to profoundly affect what roles are going to increase in demand, what new roles will emerge and what roles will also disappear: our careers work in school must therefore remain relevant and future focussed.  

And finally, how does The Crypt School balance academic learning with enrichment activities, and why is that important?

Academic learning is central to what we do here, but students want to engage with lots of other things, too. And it’s really important they do that, and through that develop their communication skills, ability to work in teams, to become leaders as well – but our programme is also about each student having fun and building friendships. 

When they leave school and look back upon their school lives in years to come, they often remember those times where they played in a team or went on a trip; took part in a debate, sung in the Cathedral or led one of our clubs or societies; acted in a play or led their House in an assembly – we have a huge programme of extracurricular and enrichment activities here at Crypt – something for everyone to engage with and grow through their participation in.

Our enrichment programme and school culture is also underpinned by our house system which offers lots of opportunities for leadership and for fun, which helps all our students develop a stronger sense of belonging to their school. Our senior students also take on leadership roles as prefects, members of our sixth form student executive team, head boy and head girl. We also have our three school parliaments, which although are focused on important aspects of school life, provide opportunities for students to engage in debate and have their say, so they feel a sense of ownership and belonging to the life and work of the school. 

Our programme builds culture, it enables friendships to flourish, and it helps the students to manage their other challenges – the workload, the expectations that they will do well academically and wider concerns that I think young people have today about our society. It’s a release from all of that and really good for their wellbeing and mental health. So it’s a fundamental part of our curriculum.

Andrew Clements 1950-2026

Music may say things that words cannot express, but he mastered the rare art of putting music into words, always using language with precision; reading him, you knew what a performance had sounded like. Best known for championing new music with tireless devotion, Andrew had much wider musical interests than many realised.

However, music was only one of his passions. Topping the list of other fascinations were natural history and Latin American literature, and these strands all came together when he reviewed the world premiere of Peter Eötvös’s opera Love and Other Demons – based on Gabriel García Márquez – at Glyndebourne in summer 2008. Welcoming the work, Andrew ended his review by saying that only the production disappointed “for its failure to evoke any real sense of place, despite the lavish use of video projections full of writhing bodies, insects and reptiles; someone might have pointed out to [the director] that there are no chameleons in South America”.

With such wide interests, Andrew could have taken several professional paths but worked in music journalism – at times as an editor as well as writer – almost all his adult life. But his first job after graduating was in the editorial department of the Open University, where he met Kate (Kathryn) Coltman. They married, and had two daughters, Lara and Holly; they separated in the 1990s.

Andrew served as music critic of the New Statesman for 11 years from 1977, also contributing to Time Out. He had a brief spell (1987-88) as editor of the Musical Times, and wrote for many years (1979-93) for the Financial Times, not only on classical music but also as the paper’s rock and pop critic. Later, in a Guardian classical review he would say that Brian Wilson’s God Only Knows was still the most perfect pop song.

Overlapping with his writing, Andrew was commissioning editor for books on music at Faber & Faber (the publisher’s connection to poets and poetry was not lost on him), midwifing several significant titles. He first wrote for Opera magazine in 1983 and joined its editorial board in 1990. When he succeeded Edward Greenfield on the Guardian in August 1993, the appointment was clinched at least in part by a recommendation from the pianist Alfred Brendel.

An unstinting admirer of some of the most challenging composers – Harrison Birtwistle, Luigi Nono, Elliott Carter, Luciano Berio, Helmut Lachenmann, Pierre Boulez and Iannis Xenakis among them – Andrew also lent critical support to many less well-known names in contemporary music.

He also had a fondness for the English pastoralist composers of the early- and mid-20th century, and indeed had grown up in Hucclecote, a village that has become a suburb of Gloucester. His mother, Linda, a domestic science teacher before her marriage, was from the Forest of Dean; his father, Joseph, who had grown up on a small family farm in Down Hatherley, to the north of Gloucester, made aeroplane parts for Dowty Aviation.

An only child, Andrew attended The Crypt school, a grammar in Gloucester, and was the first member of his family to go to university. He studied theoretical physics at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and played the flute in a university orchestra. Contemporaries remember him as a little unsocial and enigmatic – qualities that later allowed him to maintain a professional distance and to write without fear or favour.

With such a background, Andrew was well placed to attend the Cheltenham music festival during its vintage years, and also the Three Choirs festival; this was his first musical landscape, and Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius held special appeal. He would remain more committed than most critics to covering the regional scene.

In 1992 he became a director of the Holst Foundation, honouring the Cheltenham-born composer, and the poetry of Ivor Gurney meant a great deal to him. Reading the Guardian’s Country Diary was a daily ritual (as was doing the paper’s Cryptic Crossword).

Music was not in the family, but his parents had been keen gardeners and lovers of the countryside. Andrew started collecting plants as a boy and was soon ordering Bhutan alpine seeds and indexing specimens. Birds, amphibians and reptiles were special interests, and he kept many creatures as pets – on one occasion, some burglars are said to have been frightened off by his poison dart frogs.

A holiday in Crete in 1979 – his first trip abroad – made a huge impression on him, and Greece would remain one of his favourite countries for the rest of his life. Bird-watching took him the length of South America, from Costa Rica to Ecuador and the Amazon to Patagonia. This he often did with his partner Amanda Holden, the opera librettist and translator, with whom he lived in London for several years. She died in 2021.

Andrew, who I was lucky to count as a colleague and friend for three decades, contributed to The New Grove Dictionary of Music, The New Grove Dictionary of Opera and The New Penguin Opera Guide. He wrote a compact account of the composer Mark-Anthony Turnage (2000). In opera, he responded not just musically but had a strong sense of theatre.

Pianists and the piano literature were close to his heart, and his penultimate review for the Guardian, of previously unpublished recordings by Radu Lupu, had a valedictory feel: “Of the many hundreds of pianists I must have heard in more than 50 years of recital going, a multitude that has included many of the greatest names of the 20th century, none gave me more consistent pleasure or a greater sense of wonder.”

An illness starting in early 2025 meant that Andrew’s last concert review (of the Dunedin Consort) appeared in early March. Despite these difficulties, he retained the sense of humour that countered an often gruff exterior. From his home in Oxfordshire he continued reviewing recordings; his final piece, about Nadia Boulanger’s opera La Ville Morte, was written just before Christmas and published at the start of January, by which time he had contracted the flu that led to his death.

Kate survives him, along with Lara, Holly and two grandchildren.

 Andrew Joseph Clements, music critic, born 15 September 1950; died 11 January 202

Ian Williamson

The club has sent its condolences to his wife, Patricia, and his wider family.

There is a note of Ian’s induction as President in our archive.

Invictus exhibition opens at St Mary de Crypt

A new exhibition about a poem written by a Gloucester-born writer has opened.

The exhibition, at St Mary de Crypt in Southgate Street in the city centre, tells the story of the poem ‘Invictus’ by William Ernest Henley and how it has had a major impact across the world.

The poem was written in 1875, so this year marks its 150^th anniversary.  The exhibition has been put together by history students from The Crypt School, which Henley attended and which was founded at St Mary de Crypt, in conjunction with the Friends of St Mary de Crypt.

Most famously, Invictus was read daily by Nelson Mandela while he was in captivity but it has also been quoted from at different times by major figures including Winston Churchill and Barack Obama.  It was also the inspiration for Prince Harry’s Invictus Games for injured service personnel and for the 2009 film about South Africa winning the 1995 Rugby World Cup.

Paul James, Chair of the Friends of St Mary de Crypt, said, “We are very grateful to the students and staff at The Crypt School for putting this exhibition together.  It is remarkable just how much influence Invictus has had on events around the world and we should be proud that its roots are here in Gloucester.”

James Higgs, Head of History and Politics at The Crypt School, said: “Our students have relished the opportunity to research, collaborate & present their ideas on William Henley and his poetry. They have enjoyed seeing the myriad of ways it has influenced figures way beyond Gloucestershire, and throughout the world. Henley’s themes of resilience and inner strength are all incredibly relevant to our students today.

The exhibition is free to view and St Mary de Crypt is open Wednesday-Saturday from 11am-3pm (except the morning of Wednesday 19^th November when it will be closed due to a theatrical production).  The exhibition will run until the end of the year.

INVICTUS

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.

William Ernest Henley 1849 – 1903
Born on Eastgate Street, Gloucester, Crypt School alumnus, William Ernest Henley, went on to become a celebrated poet, writer and literary critic. He was moved to write the 1875 poem, ‘Invictus’, whilst recovering from surgery to save his remaining leg, having lost one when he was 16 to complications arising from tuberculosis.
Evoking the indefatigable spirit, self discipline and fortitude in adversity, Invictus has inspired many and was quoted at different times by leaders including Sir Winston Churchill and Barack Obama.
Whilst incarcerated at Robben Island prison, Nelson Mandela recited the poem to other prisoners and was empowered by its message of self-mastery. He was forever linked to ‘Invictus’ when his early presidency of South Africa and the 1995 Rugby World Cup triumph were immortalised by the 2009 film of the same name.

The Cryptian Magazine 2025/26

The Cryptian Magazine is now available on line. Please follow this link for the full magazine.

Once again, the school has provided a lot of interesting and informative content – there is so much going on at the school these days both inside and outside of the classrooms.

Steve Knibbs edits the Crypt Alumni content. Please contact *******@**********ns.org“>Steve or Adam with any comments or content for next year.

Founders’ Day Service and Supper

Reunion Dinner report

Dear Cryptian,

I wanted to report back to you about the Old Cryptians Annual Dinner held on Saturday 29th March.

We had over 60 people attend from many different school years and I would like to take this opportunity to personally thank you all for supporting the event. I sincerely hope you enjoyed the meal and catching up with your school friends. The tour round the school was a success and many told me that they were surprised at just how much the school has grown, both in pupil numbers and the buildings accommodating them, since they had been there. The school’s popularity has been cemented by an ‘Outstanding’ Ofsted rating and, under Nick Dyer’s leadership, I am sure this success will continue.

Several from my year turned up to listen to our fellow school friend David Fannin talk about what he’s done since leaving school, the business he set up, his appearance on Dragons’ Den, the difficulties with Brexit and sourcing manufacturing abroad and the eventual sale of the business, leading to his early retirement.  As I said in my speech, it really was an example of what hard work and dedication can bring you and should hopefully be an inspiration to the students who joined us at the meal. 

Talking of inspiration I also made reference to William E Henley as it’s the 150th anniversary of his most famous poem Invictus being written; if there’s ever a poem that could be used as motivation for the students it’s this poem which has served as an inspiration to so many.

It was a proud moment for me as an old pupil to stand on the stage again after so many years and tell people of my time at Crypt and how it has inspired me over the years. It really has. I learnt so many lessons at the school, both in and out of the classroom, that have served me well over the years.  Even people knowing that you went to Crypt School can open doors for you in life as it has done for me, as well as causing many a friendly rivalry with some of the Old Richians I’ve met over the years. Some of the teachers at the school I remember fondly and would like to thank them for the knowledge they instilled in me. 

Lastly, I would like to thank those who organised the event and made it possible and everyone who came along on the night, especially those who had not been to the annual dinner before. It was great to see you all and catch up especially seeing some old school friends who I’d not seen since school. Watching you trying to remember the words to the school song will keep me entertained for many years to come!  It’s my sincere hope that the annual dinner be used as a reunion and will grow and grow over the years; so if you want to catch up with your school friends and see what they’ve been up to, please come along in 2026 and for many years after.

Hopefully I’ll see you again next year.

Thanks again,
Matt Cass
Old Cryptians’ Club President 2024-2025

OCRFC Centenary Book

OCC Reunion Dinner 2025

From the President

Hi, I’m Matt Cass and I was at The Crypt School from 1984 – 1991. I’m Gloucester born and bred and still live and work in the city and consider it an honour to have gone to The Crypt School. I’m still close friends with many school friends and keep in touch with many of my class mates from that era. In fact over the last few years we have organised a class reunion where a good number of us have met up and had a great time catching up with each other – some of whom I had not seen since school days. It’s great to see how people have grown and succeeded, what jobs they have and who has moved to different countries.

When I was at school we had at one point about 300-400 pupils in the school as a whole and nowadays there are over 1,000!  Apparently the school is so popular that people are coming from afar as Swindon and Wales!

William E Henley

2024 is the 175th anniversary of William E Henley’s birth (he went to The Crypt School from 1861–1867) and 2025 is the 150-year anniversary of his most famous poem, ‘Invictus’.

For those of you that don’t know much about Henley:
He lived in Eastgate Street in Gloucester and even has a House at the school named after him.
He suffered from Tuberculosis at age 20 and had a leg amputated.
He was friends with Robert Lois Stevenson who wrote “Treasure Island”.  Henley is believed to be the inspiration for Long John Silver in his book; probably because of him losing one leg.
He also wrote ‘Invictus’ which is arguably his most famous poem; which Nelson Mandela quoted as inspiring him during his 27 years of captivity.
It is also the inspiration for the 2009 ‘Invictus’ film starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon about South Africa winning the 1995 Rugby World Cup.
The Invictus Games founded by Prince Harry also takes it name from the poem.
And it all started at The Old School Room at St Mary de Crypt on Southgate Street, where The Crypt School was founded.

It is an honour to be linked to a school with such a rich heritage and such a positive present and future. I will do my best during my term of office to do the club and the school proud.
  
Kind Regards,
 
Matthew Cass
OCC President 2024-2025

pr*******@**********ns.org