[3] Former pupils of Dinnington High School are known as Old Dinnonians, and they include 19th century criminal Charles Peace[4] and historian Ebenezer Rhodes.

[4] The school is based entirely on a 50-acre estate, containing all academic buildings and facilities, including the ruins of an 18th-century folly,[5] and a well-preserved 20th century traditional gymnasium.

Admissions to the lower school are non-selective; the sixth form offers places on academic conditions.

[9] It was a small dame school in the town,[10] only large enough to accommodate the local demands at the time.

The school consisted of a single timber building, constructed at the cost of around £21,300,[2] and divided into girls' and boys' departments.

After the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, Lieutenant Pepper and Sergeant Major Cressey were keen to obtain school buildings as barracks.

[citation needed] Air raid shelters were completed on school grounds in April 1940.

[2] In 1957 the two halves merged to form the coeducational Dinnington Secondary Modern School, with proposals under discussion for a further merger with the secondary technical element of the neighbouring Dinnington Chelmsford Technical College, to create the area's first comprehensive school.

[6] The school played a key role in the introduction of rugby union to the local area, and in turn to the establishment of Dinnington Rugby Club,[13] which has produced players for the county and for Senior clubs such as Rotherham, Harlequins and Northampton.

[citation needed] The campus continued to be extended following the merger, with the addition of a swimming pool, technology block, sports hall, new sixth form base and library in the 1970s and 1980s.

With the murderer still at large, concerns about student safety forced the school to act quickly.