St Leonard's

Our Brand-New School: You are joining St Leonard’s at one of the most significant stages of our history, as we look forward to our new school building. This is a once in a generation moment; your child will be amongst the first pupils to benefit from the investment of a £71 million project.

We are moving into our new school in just over a month from now. This means your child will be part of the first ever Year 7 cohort, to start their St Leonard’s journey in the incredible new building and be part of the school’s history. What a privilege! We cannot wait to show you and your child the state-of-the-art facilities, which will be their new home, and to see them thrive in the fantastic new purpose-built environment.

Our School Community: We feel that our Ofsted inspection in October 2024 captured the uniqueness of St Leonard’s. The report began quoting our vision: ‘St Leonard’s Catholic School proudly states that ‘all pupils are known and loved . . . this spreads through the culture of the school.’ The report went on to say: ‘Pupils love coming to school.  There is an exceptional culture of high expectations. As a result, pupils flourish academically and socially.’ We are proud of the pupils in our school; they actively build our school community, and the five outstanding judgements from Ofsted reflect both the excellence of our pupils as well as the expertise and dedication of the teaching and support staff.

Life at St Leonard’s

Our Ethos: St Leonard’s is a traditional Catholic school where our vision is to ensure that all pupils are known and loved. Our staff and students live out our school ethos in everything that we do: 

Our Standards: We are very proud of the extremely high standards demonstrated by our pupils and staff; excellent manners, attendance and behaviour allow us to thrive in a calm and positive environment.

Our Achievement: We are incredibly proud of the hard work and dedication that has gone into our outstanding academic achievement over the past few years.

GCSE: St Leonard’s pupils exceed the national average by between a half and almost a full grade in all subjects.

Area	Number of Schools	2023	2024	2025
Diocese	20	1st	2nd	1st
County Durham	38	3rd	2nd	1st
Northeast	171	4th	4th	3rd

A Level: St Leonard’s students achieve very strongly and are ranked amongst the highest performing schools in the Northeast for university destinations, including nearly 70% attending Russell Group Universities. In 2025, we were awarded three Sunday Times Parent Power awards, including recognition for Academic Excellence.  

Our Enrichment: As a school we place great importance on the development of the whole person. As such we run an extensive range of clubs and societies for pupils to enjoy; exploring new hobbies and skills in parallel with their day-to-day lessons. We currently offer over 50 enrichment clubs and run frequent trips for all year groups. See here. We want all our pupils to develop into confident, happy, responsible, well-rounded individuals armed with a wealth of experience to help them achieve and enjoy success and happiness in life.

Our School: Please see our prospectus for an overview of our school.

Transition Programme: Over the coming months, a carefully planned transition programme will take place, enabling your child to familiarise themselves with our school. We want to make the change from Primary School to Secondary School as smooth and exciting as possible.  A brief outline of the planned events is below.  We hope this will answer all the questions you and your child may have. Further details on events, such as timings and logistics, will follow in subsequent communications.

Event	About the event	Date and time
Primary school visits	St Leonard’s staff hold workshops within our feeder primary schools, welcoming pupils into our school community.	Week commencing 18th May 2026
Family Support	Pupils who may need additional support with transition will work with our Pupil Support Team for enhanced transition to ensure they are fully known and supported.	SEND Enhanced visits Week commencing 8th June 2026
Non feeder Primary school visit	All pupils from non-feeder primary schools visit St Leonard’s to meet staff and be welcomed into our school community.	4th June 2026, 1:30pm – 3:00pm
Intake Evening	Parents’ and pupil welcome and information evening. This is a time to meet key staff and get to see our brand-new building for the first time!	Monday 29th June 2026
Intake day	All pupils joining us in September 2026 will follow a timetable and try out some lessons in their new tutor groups.	Friday 3rd July 2026
Summer School 2026	Pupils take part in fun activities and sports with their new friends in tutor groups, a great chance to become familiarised with St Leonard’s.	Monday 20th-Tuesday 21st July 2026
First Day	The journey begins – first day of secondary school in our new build!	Wednesday 2nd September 2026

Information: We will continue to share updates and exciting tasters into our life at St Leonard’s on our website and social media pages:

Admissions: Mrs Callender is available to help answer any questions regarding the admissions process on: ncallender@stl.bwcet.com

SEND: Mrs Turnbull will be able to help with any enquires regarding Enhanced Transition: SEND@stl.bwcet.com

If you would like to ask a question or pass on any information, please contact the school using the contact form on our website here.