The Crypt School

If your child is academically able and you want a school that is serious about work but unmistakably kind, The Crypt rewards a careful look. It is one of the oldest schools in the country, founded in Gloucester in 1539 by Joan Cooke in memory of her husband John, and its earliest schoolroom still survives at St Mary de Crypt Church in the city centre. The poet W.E. Henley, who wrote 'Invictus', was a pupil here in the 1860s, which gives you a sense of how far back the school's story runs. It has since settled at its Podsmead site. For most of its life it taught boys; the sixth form became co-educational in the 1980s, and since 2018 it has taken girls and boys from Year 7, making it the only fully co-educational selective school in Gloucester.

The Good Schools Guide describes a school its reviewers found exceptionally kind, a place where staff and pupils genuinely look after one another. That care sits alongside serious academic work and a full range of activities beyond the classroom, from sport to music. The long history gives the school a strong sense of who it is without making it stuffy, and the move to a mixed intake has given it a more rounded, modern feel while keeping the things parents value most.

This is a good fit for an academically able child of either sex who will do well in a warm school with deep roots and high standards. The Crypt is led by headteacher Mr Nicholas Dyer, and the children who do best here are the ones who feel looked after.