3 September 2014 (2014-09-03) – 21 October 2022 (2022-10-21)
Our School is a British documentaryreality television programme on CBBC which first aired on 3 September 2014 and has run for eight series. It uses a fly-on-the-wall format to show the everyday lives of the staff and pupils in secondary schools and follows children as they move from Year 6 into Year 7. From series 5 onwards, the series featured pupils in both Year 7 and Year 8.
In 2019, a spin-off called Our School Summer Camp was made, featuring students from series 1, 2 and 3, and some new students, joined by headteacher Shirley Ballas.
Series overview
Series
Episodes
Originally aired
First aired
Last aired
1
16
3 September 2014 (2014-09-03)
7 September 2015 (2015-09-07)
2
15
5 January 2016 (2016-01-05)
19 April 2016 (2016-04-19)
3
15
5 September 2017 (2017-09-05)
12 December 2017 (2017-12-12)
4
20
7 August 2018 (2018-08-07)
18 December 2018 (2018-12-18)
5
20
3 September 2019 (2019-09-03)
10 December 2019 (2019-12-10)
6
22
26 August 2020 (2020-08-26)
23 December 2020 (2020-12-23)
7
20
6 September 2021 (2021-09-06)
28 January 2022 (2022-01-28)
8
20
26 September 2022 (2022-09-26)
21 October 2022 (2022-10-21)
Development and production
Our School was commissioned in September 2013 by the production company TwoFour and CBBC (the children's television brand owned by the BBC and primarily aimed at children aged between the ages of 7 and 16).[1] Each series of programmes follows the day-to-day school life of 11-year-olds as they transition from different primary schools to embark on their first year at a secondary school and the commencement of their Key Stage 3 education. The programme uses a fly-on-the-wall camera approach to record the trials and tribulations, the joys and the sorrows, and the successes and surprises, of eleven Year 7 pupils throughout the whole academic year. Each series is filmed in a different school.
Our School was publicly announced in early 2014. The series follows the same overall format as Educating..., another documentary reality television programme on Channel 4 from the same production company which was first broadcast in September 2011 and which also uses fly-on-the-wall cameras.
Our School has run for eight series on CBBC and BBC iPlayer to date, with each series having between 15 and 20 episodes, and with each episode focusing on a particular event, group of students or storyline. In addition, there have been multiple specials in which students and schools from previous series are revisited.
Episodes
Series 1 (2014–15)
The first series was filmed at Conyers School in the town of Yarm near Middlesbrough. It showed the Year 7 classes experiencing secondary school for the first time and featured some of the challenges they may face in later life.
The first series was made up of 15x30 minute episodes and began to be broadcast on 3 September 2014. The final episode of the series was aired on 10 December 2014.
In 2015, it was announced that a special episode would be added to the first series. This aired on 7 September 2015 and was a catch-up episode that saw the cameras return to see what had happened to the Year 7 pupils, who were now in Year 8.
This series began to be aired on 5 January 2016 and ran for 15 weeks, with the final episode being broadcast on 12 April 2016. It was retitled Our School 2 and followed the same format as Series 1.[2]
No. overall
Title
Original air date
17
New Starts
5 January 2016
18
On The Ball
12 January 2016
19
Getting Ahead
19 January 2016
20
Find Your Focus
26 January 2016
21
Change Your Ways
2 February 2016
22
Going Forward, Stepping Back
9 February 2016
23
You've Got A Friend
16 February 2016
24
Who Am I?
23 February 2016
25
My Camera Never Lies
1 March 2016
26
Helping Out
8 March 2016
27
The Hunger Game
15 March 2016
28
We Can Be Heroes
22 March 2016
29
Where The Heart Is
29 March 2016
30
In It To Win It
5 April 2016
31
Show Stopper
12 April 2016
Series 3 (2017)
Before the launch of the third series there was one-off special, which saw two students, one from Series 1 and one from Series 2, swap schools for a day and get to know and interact with the other students. The special aired in August 2017.
The fifth series was filmed in south Wales, at Hawthorn High School (Ysgol Uwchradd Y Hawthorn) in the village of Hawthorn, Rhondda Cynon Taf near Pontypridd. In a new feature, for the first time year 8 pupils were also featured alongside the year 7 pupils in the show.
Series 7, filmed at Firth Park Academy, started broadcasting on CBBC on 6 September 2021. The series consists of 20 episodes aired over selected weeks of the Autumn and Spring terms of the current academic year as part of the Bitesize programming block. The first ten episodes aired during the first two weeks of the school year before taking a break. The series resumed with the remaining ten episodes from 17 January 2022. The episodes were made available on iPlayer as well.
Episodes
Episode Number
Episode Name
Original Air Date
1
Bin Those Fears
6 September 2021
2
That’ll Teach Them
7 September 2021
3
The Pet Test
8 September 2021
4
The Rabbit Whisperer
9 September 2021
5
Mind Games
10 September 2021
6
Viva Espana!
13 September 2021
7
There's No Planet B
14 September 2021
8
Takeover Day
15 September 2021
9
Grow Your Own Library
16 September 2021
10
From Ramadan to Eid
17 September 2021
11
You Snooze You Lose
17 January 2022
12
Puppy Love
18 January 2022
13
Growing Pains
19 January 2022
14
This Little Piggy
20 January 2022
15
How to Be a Winner
21 January 2022
16
King Tim and the Big Art Scam
24 January 2022
17
Cool to Be Kind
25 January 2022
18
You're Hired
26 January 2022
19
Just Be Fierce
27 January 2022
20
Brave The Stage
28 January 2022
Series 8 (2022) Our Boarding School
Series 8 was filmed at Badminton School, an independent boarding and day school for girls in Westbury-on-Trym, Bristol. The series was scheduled to start on 12 September 2022 but was delayed to a later date due to the death of Elizabeth II. As such, the BBC iPlayer synopsis for the episode "Pen Pals" has a notice saying that it was filmed in 2021 before her death, as she is mentioned in the present tense once. The series is narrated by Diane Morgan.
Episodes
Episode Number
Episode Name
Original Air Date
1
Away from Home
26 September 2022
2
Around the House
27 September 2022
3
Year of the Tiger
28 September 2022
4
Watch This Space
29 September 2022
5
Braving the Storm
30 September 2022
6
All About Emily
3 October 2022
7
Join the Club
4 October 2022
8
All the Feels
5 October 2022
9
School of Rock
6 October 2022
10
Pen Pals
7 October 2022
11
New to the Nest
10 October 2022
12
Can You Cook It?
11 October 2022
13
House Wars
12 October 2022
14
What's On Your Mind?
13 October 2022
15
How it Started/How it's Going
14 October 2022
16
Take the Plunge
17 October 2022
17
The Staff of Destiny
18 October 2022
18
How to Get a Head
19 October 2022
19
Prom Planners
20 October 2022
20
School, Good Vibes Only
21 October 2022
References
^Catherine Booth Bible College (1989), CBBC, Office of Media Ministries, OCLC1057737839