General News
20 April, 2024
100 years on the hilltop
Dimboola Memorial Secondary College (DMSC is celebrating 100 years of educating the local communities’ youth next month on Saturday, May 25, with an afternoon tea and school tour, commemorative service and dinner in the assembly hall.
Dimboola Memorial Secondary College (DMSC is celebrating 100 years of educating the local communities’ youth next month on Saturday, May 25, with an afternoon tea and school tour, commemorative service and dinner in the assembly hall.
The school was originally called Dimboola Soldiers Memorial Higher Elementary School (DHES), from 1924 to 1945, before being renamed Dimboola Memorial High School (DMHS) in 1946, and finally settling as Dimboola Memorial Secondary College in 1987.
The school was erected as a memorial to those who fought in WWI, and the majority of today’s buildings are from the 1950s, but the facility has had centres for language and science recently added, along with an assembly hall extension.
In 1921, the decision to build an elementary school on the hill was finalised, and £3442 was raised for its construction - £3000 was given to the Department of Education, £330 was spent on an honour roll, £16 was spent on a flagpole, and the left-over funds were spent clearing the Mallee scrub.
The school was occupied from May 1924, but officially opened on December 2.
In 1945, the elementary school became a high school, welcoming its first Form 5 (Year 11) class.
In 1971 the assembly hall was opened, with a canteen and dining room added in 1981.
In 1980 the present administration block opened.
The gates to the school also stand as a dedicated War Memorial to the memory of ex-students who served in WW2.
DMSC principal Sally Klinge said almost 200 people have registered to attend the school’s centenary afternoon tea and commemorative service, and a further 170 have booked to attend the dinner that evening.
Bookings remain open until midnight on Sunday, May 5.
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