From the earliest age, Rupert has been involved in the outdoors. An idyllic childhood in the Forest of Dean on a private deer estate made for long days outdoors in the mature Beech and Oak woodlands and there were very few pheasant pens, snare lines or streams with crayfish pools that he was not aware of by the age of 9 or 10.
Shooting with a rifle and shotgun also started young. He was often used as a beater for pheasant shoots and a walking beater, and later a gun for walking rough grouse shoots in the Borders where he spent a significant part of every summer with his grandparents. He continued his love of shooting by becoming an Air Rifle and Air Pistol instructor and educating a new young generation of shots.
A visit to the ‘Game Fair’ at the Bowwood estate started a fascination with archery that has continued to this day with an Archery Leaders qualification. Recently, from a quartered ash stave, he made a functioning ‘primitive’ longbow. Arrows are already made and fletched and the next element is the production of an all natural linen string. This is in a sense the completion of a circle. He spent many hours at his father’s sawmill as well as accompanying him on trips to evaluate prospective woodlands, and feed the fireplace with chainsaw and axe, something that his children are now inheriting for themselves.
The Forest of Dean also gave rise to a love of mountain biking, though this was not what it was called then. It was simply a way of extending his range to cover more of the estate. He continues to share this sport with his younger son with frequent rides near his home in Leicestershire and on the trails at Cannock Chase. This has also been combined with dog ownership and he has trained him to take part in Bikejoring with reasonable control and competed in Canicross with the dog on foot.
Rupert has tried to maintain links with the outdoors throughout his working life. An interest in wine that started with retail resulted in a successful winemaking career that took him to work in Italy, France, North America and Australia. On his return to the UK he took a job as a science teacher which gave the opportunity to become part of an Outdoor Learning team as well as to set up and coach a groundbreaking alternative sports program.
He is used to including a significant component of experiential learning in his classroom lessons, taking learning outside his laboratory and allowing failure at a task to inform further learning, thereby encouraging resilience. When the school started its outdoor learning program Rupert jumped at the opportunity and became a member of the steering group as well as writing and delivering a significant part of the program to children from year 4 to year 8.
Rupert's interest in 'strange' sports led him to create a program of alternative sports which provided opportunities for 'non-sporty' children to expand their experience into individual sports like Fencing, Air rifle, Archery, Mountain Biking Climbing and Tchoukball. He was able to change both attitudes to sport with these children and, unexpectedly, their academic results. His experience in Outdoor Learning throughout his teaching led to the certainty that the many children who are not well served by conventional classroom methods thrive in the outdoors.
A course run under the Institute of Outdoor Learning in Bushcraft cemented these ideas and provided the mechanism for the delivery of science at GCSE level (and potentially above) while acquiring essential bushcraft skills. In the Summer holidays this year he passed his assessment for the Institute of Outdoor Learning Bushcraft Competency before assisting in the training of his son a couple of weeks later.
Rupert lives with his wife, two sons and a dog in Leicestershire. The whole family enjoys the outdoors through biking, climbing and camping.
When the opportunity came to become involved in a teaching woodland at Grangewood in Derbyshire, the choice was obvious and Rupert formed Feral Science with the aim of delivering core concepts from the GCSE sciences in an Outdoor Environment illustrating these through bushcraft.