On 1 June 2011 Michael Gove, the Secretary of State for Education, approved the school's application to become an Academy. Also in 2011, a food technology room was opened. A proposal was made to relocate a Synthetic Turf Pitch, which was at the time located at the Handy Cross leisure centre, to the JHGS site as part of a wider redevelopment of the leisure centre. Construction work was underway as of October 2013, and was in use by late January 2014.