Durham Johnston Comprehensive School

About Durham Johnston Comprehensive School

Durham Johnston Comprehensive School holds a Good rating from its most recent Ofsted inspection in 2025, but the story of its academic outcomes is more nuanced than that single grade suggests. The school’s Progress 8 score of 0.18 is a strong indicator of how much value it adds for its pupils, placing it well above the County Durham local authority average of -0.21. This means that, on average, students here achieve nearly a fifth of a grade more per subject than pupils with similar starting points nationally. In the local authority rankings, the school sits 9th out of 31 secondary schools, putting it in the top third. The school also performs strongly on the basics measure, with 80.3% of pupils achieving a grade 4 or above in both English and maths. While the overall Progress 8 banding is described as ‘Average’, the school’s maths Progress 8 score of 0.25 and EBacc Progress 8 of 0.23 both suggest particular strength in these areas.

At sixth form, the school’s performance is even more striking. The sixth form was rated Outstanding by Ofsted, and the A-level value added score of 0.27 is classified as ‘Above average’. Students achieved an average of 41.47 points per entry, equivalent to a B grade, and 31.2% of entries were at AAB or higher. The school’s Attainment 8 score at KS4 is 56.7, comfortably above the national average. In the North East region, the school ranks 31st out of 142 schools by Progress 8, placing it in the top 22% regionally. Nationally, it sits in the top 36% of all schools. The EBacc entry rate is 27.8%, with 25.9% of pupils achieving the EBacc at grade 4 or above, suggesting a solid but not dominant focus on the full EBacc suite.

The school is heavily oversubscribed, with 780 applications for 260 places in the 2025/26 admissions round, a ratio of 3:1. Of the 309 first-preference applications, 259 were offered places, indicating strong local demand. Facilities are extensive and include a swimming pool, astro turf, tennis courts, a gymnasium, and a dedicated sixth form centre. The school offers a wide range of SEND provisions, covering areas from dyslexia and moderate learning difficulties to autistic spectrum disorder and physical disabilities. Parent views are overwhelmingly positive: 92% would recommend the school, and 93% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that their child is happy. The school suits families who value strong academic outcomes, particularly in maths and at A-level, and who want a large, well-resourced secondary with a busy extracurricular programme including clubs like Model UN, DofE, and Young Enterprise.

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