High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The eighth season of Degrassi: The Next Generation premiered in Canada on 5 October 2008, and consisted of twenty-two episodes (18 episodes, and 1 movie). Degrassi: The Next Generation is a Canadian serial teen drama television series. Although it aired during the 2008 2009 TV season, it depicted the first semester of the 2007 08 school year, because during seasons six through nine the series only showed one semester over an entire season. This season depicts the lives of a group of high school children and college freshmen as they deal with the some of the challenges and issues young adults face such as relationships, sex, violence, sexual identity, police involvement, drug abuse, dropping out, mental illness, child molestation, gunpoint robbery and shooting. Thirteen actors were added to the ensemble cast, while fourteen cast members have either left the series or been dropped from the main cast to recurring roles. The season focused heavily on the new, younger students of Degrassi Community School, although it included storylines about the school seniors, and those who have graduated and gone on to university.