The schools are New Southgate's strongest card. The primaries post solid maths results. The secondaries finish above the middle of the pack. Barnet has almost nothing graded below good. Parents here are picking between good schools, and most places have fewer of those to pick from.
There are eight state primaries in the area, and on the government's Key Stage 2 maths measure they average a score of about 106. The 2019 Department for Transport model puts the nearest primary about an eight-minute walk from the typical home. St Paul's CofE Primary School N11 is the one that carries the postcode in its name. Bounds Green Infant School and Bounds Green Junior School serve the Bounds Green side, so a family there can keep a child on the same street from the first day of reception to the last day of Year 6. The school run around here is shorter than most children's attention span.
The area has three state secondaries, with a pupil-weighted Attainment 8 score of about 54. Friern Barnet School is the closest name on the list. Its name comes from the area next door, which is a New Southgate habit: the station has spent most of its life sharing a name with its neighbours too. Alexandra Park School is the other secondary families here tend to weigh up. The nearest secondary is about a thirteen-minute walk on the same 2019 transport model, which puts it in walking distance for most teenagers.
Across the London Borough of Barnet, Ofsted has given a grade of good or outstanding to 57 of the 59 settings it has graded, which leaves almost no weak schools in the borough. Twelve are outstanding, two require improvement and none are inadequate. Another 66 settings have no published grade yet, and they are left out of those counts entirely. Barnet's record is good enough that failing schools hardly feature in conversations about where to send a child.
None of this buys a place by itself. The council allocates places under its published admissions rules, so living round the corner from St Paul's or Bounds Green Junior does not secure a seat there. New Southgate straddles Barnet, Enfield and a corner of Haringey, so find out which council your address falls under and read that council's admissions criteria before you treat any nearby school as yours. Two parents on the same stretch of road can be dealing with different councils and different rules.
For schools, New Southgate is one of the strongest choices in this part of north London. Good primaries are within walking distance, the secondaries are close, and almost nothing nearby is graded below good, so the hard part for parents is getting the place, not finding a decent school.