Produced by Schuyler and Hood's Playing With Time, development of the series began soon after the end of The Kids of Degrassi Street, in response to a perceived lack of teenage representation in media.

The series received widespread critical acclaim on release, with praise directed at its realism, cinematography, and portrayal of serious topics, but became a significant commercial success in Canada after it was moved to a prime-time spot, while it also developed cult followings in the United States and Australia.

[4][5] The series deals with a wide range of subjects through its characters, including serious issues such as teenage pregnancy, abuse, bullying,[6] racism, interracial dating, drugs, alcoholism,[6] drunk driving, and eating disorders, as well as more mundane coming-of-age experiences, such as relationships,[7] exams,[8] and puberty.

[19] According to Kathryn Ellis, the unique casting system of Degrassi Junior High was so that every member of the repertory company had "equal status", although some characters were more prominent than others.

[21] Crew members occasionally made background appearances, including art director Judy Shiner, picture editor Rob de Lint, and publicist Kathryn Ellis.

[22][23]In 1976, Ontario schoolteacher Linda Schuyler, an aspiring filmmaker, and her partner Kit Hood, an editor, founded the company Playing With Time to produce educational films and documentaries.

[48] Schuyler explained to Jacobson that she was looking for a school version of Hill Street Blues, of which she "loved the intertwined storylines, some of which were resolved at the end of an episode and others which carried on to the next.

[75] This includes bands such as "Gourmet Scum", movies such as "Teen Academy IV" and "Swamp Sex Robots", game shows such as "Quest for the Best", and soap operas such as "Days Of Passion".

[86] A frequent plot point in the series concerns the Zit Remedy, a fictional garage rock band comprising Joey Jeremiah on keyboards, Archie "Snake" Simpson on guitar, and Derek "Wheels" Wheeler on bass.

Their respective actors, Pat Mastroianni, Stefan Brogren and Neil Hope, were musically inexperienced and were guided by Lewis Manne on how to play their instruments.

Starting from its second season, due to a budget squeeze, it was then moved to Monday nights at 7:30 p.m,[104] and then later by then-new CBC programming chief Ivan Fecan, a supporter of the show,[105][106] to primetime at 8:30 p.m,[107] between the popular American series Kate & Allie and Newhart.

[116] By November 1988, Degrassi Junior High was being shown in over forty countries, including Australia, Greece, China, France,[117] and the United Kingdom, where it was screened on the BBC starting from 5 April 1988.

Robert James of the Times Colonist stated: "Unlike the wholesome role models that populate most TV series in the increasingly conservative '80s, these teenagers often learn from their own mistakes.

"[181] Writing for the Edmonton Journal, Bob Remington felt Degrassi Junior High was an exception to "unrealistically antiseptic" television series such as The Cosby Show and Our House.

[182] Dave Rhein, in a review for wire service Gannett, declared it to be a "diamond in the rough, that puts to shame commercial network efforts to create a show aimed at teenagers".

[183] Praise was also given to the show's technical aspects; Anne Weiss of Cinema Canada magazine noted that "the style is untheatrical, non-demonstrative, giving the illusion that the young actors are simply acting out their lives".

[54] In 1989, the series was profiled by John Fisher Burns, also of the New York Times, who asserted it was "remolding the pat-a-cake image of what the industry, with at least some sense of paradox, likes to call ''children's television.

[187][188] At the end of season 2 in April 1988, Toronto Star's Jim Bawden reported that its viewership "hovered around 1.2 million a week, one of the brightest spots on Canadian TV".

[187][190] In the United Kingdom, where several episodes drew controversy and weren't aired in its regular slot, the series amassed six million viewers, making it the highest-rated children's program at the time.

[192] Cast members also participated in local public service events; for instance, Bill Parrott, who played Shane McKay, co-hosted the launch of the Kids Help Phone hotline in Toronto.

[198] The video, narrated by Amanda Stepto,[199] focused on the impending ratification of the Convention and highlighted the childhood experiences of several cast members in refugee camps and natural disasters.

Ian Warden of The Canberra Times, speaking of its continued re-runs on the ABC in Australia, asserted in 1995 that it was "perhaps the best sustained piece of children's television drama ever made".

[175] Ottawa Citizen critic Tony Atherton, in a mixed review of the premiere episode of Degrassi: The Next Generation, made numerous comparisons between the characters of the older and newer series, and felt that due to the "deluge of teen dramas since".

[1] Reviewing the DVD release of its first season in 2007, Andrew Mickel of Den of Geek felt the show still held up twenty years after its debut, and stated that its "real strength" is that "it is massively unfair, and the moral lessons aren’t hammered into each episode with a patronising mallet".

's Noel Dix, also reviewing the DVD release, remarked: "Even to this day most shows geared towards teenagers would rather deal with absurd and unrealistic scenarios for sensationalistic results than deal with problems their viewers may experience", and that "instead of it feeling like a stuffy educational show, Degrassi felt warm because its characters were real, awkward and somewhat unattractive, just like real high school!

"[221] In 2016, David Berry of the National Post noted the difference between the show and the "slicker" Next Generation, saying that it was "like someone snuck a piece of avant-garde socialist realism onto mainstream network airwaves".

[236] Writing about the death of actor Neil Hope, the New York Times's Paul Vitello said the show anticipated Beverly Hills 90210 as well as the MTV's The Real World.

[81][238][239]American filmmaker Kevin Smith was a particular fan of Degrassi Junior High, having discovered it while working at a convenience store in New Jersey, and acknowledged an infatuation with Stacie Mistysyn and her character Caitlin Ryan.

[79][244] Smith, along with Jason Mewes, guest-starred on and wrote several episodes of Degrassi: The Next Generation, in which they play fictional versions of themselves filming a Jay and Silent Bob movie at the school.

One of these sites, Degrassi Online, maintained by University of Waterloo student Mark Aaron Polger, was particularly comprehensive, hosting multimedia and a collection of user-submitted fanfiction.