Sainik School Tilaiya was founded on 16 September 1963 by the then Bihar Chief Minister Shri K.B. Sahay and Union Defence Minister V.K. Krishna Menon in the picturesque backdrop of Tilaiya Dam of Koderma district with Lt. Col. L.E.G. Smith as its first Principal. The school adopted ‘अग्रे सरत सर्वदा’ (‘Forward Ever’) as its motto and started its journey with a small of batch of students.
Like all other Sainik Schools across India, SST’s objective was to prepare boys for entry to the National Defence Academy as well as to get them ready for excelling in other walks of life. By now, thousands of students have passed out from SST and embarked upon their journey to serve their motherland either as officers of the Armed Forces or in their chosen vocation.
To begin with, the school admitted students from Bihar who had to undergo a rigorous admission process through a national competition for finding a seat at SST. After the bifurcation of Bihar in 2000, SST came in the jurisdiction of the newly created state of Jharkhand. Bihar got its own new Sainik Schools at Nalanda and Gopalganj. However, given its glorious history, SST maintains an umbilical relationship with all its students from unified Bihar, irrespective of the fact whether they are now residents of Bihar or Jharkhand