St John Henry Newman Catholic VA Primary School

About St John Henry Newman Catholic VA Primary School

Parents are overwhelmingly positive about St John Henry Newman Catholic VA Primary School. In the most recent Parent View survey, covering September 2024 to September 2025, 99% of the 80 respondents said they would recommend the school to other parents. That near-unanimous satisfaction is backed up by some very strong individual scores: 96% of parents strongly agreed or agreed that their child is happy at the school, and 98% felt the same about their child feeling safe. The school is also clearly popular on the ground. For the 2025/26 admissions round, it received 88 applications for just 50 places, giving an oversubscription ratio of 1.76. Of those 88 applications, 48 were first-preference choices, and all 48 received offers. That level of demand suggests a school that local families are actively choosing, not just defaulting to.

Academically, the school performs well above the local average. In the 2023/24 Key Stage 2 results, 76% of pupils reached the expected standard in reading, writing and maths combined, compared with a Peterborough local authority average of 59%. That puts St John Henry Newman 7th out of 53 primary schools in the area, comfortably inside the top 25% nationally. Looking at individual subjects, 83% of pupils met the expected standard in both reading and maths, with average scaled scores of 107 and 106 respectively. The proportion reaching the higher standard was 34% in reading, 31% in maths, and 10% in writing. The school's most recent Ofsted inspection, in March 2025, awarded Outstanding grades across the board — for quality of education, behaviour and attitudes, personal development, leadership and management, and early years provision. It's a clean sweep of top marks.

The school is a Catholic voluntary-aided primary for mixed pupils aged 4 to 11, with headteacher Mark Cooper. It currently has 360 pupils against a capacity of 630, so there is room to grow. Facilities include a Forest School, a sensory room, a chapel, music rooms, art studios, an ICT suite, and playing fields. Sports on offer include swimming, gymnastics, athletics, cross country, cricket and tennis, and there is a good range of clubs from chess and choir to science and eco club. For SEND, the school supports children with specific learning difficulties (including dyslexia), moderate learning difficulties, social, emotional and mental health needs, speech, language and communication needs, and autistic spectrum disorder. However, the Parent View data on SEND support is more mixed: while 64% of parents agreed or strongly agreed that the school gives SEND children the support they need, 27% disagreed or strongly disagreed, and 9% didn't know. That's a notable minority to be aware of if your child has additional needs. Overall, this is a strong, popular Catholic primary with excellent academic outcomes and a very positive parent community, but one where it's worth digging deeper on SEND provision if that applies to your family.

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