More about Essex:
Essex has one public school that offers instruction to children from pre-kindergarten to grade 6. The Essex Middle School had previously functioned to educate students to grade 8. But recent regionalization has brought the Essex Middle School children into the Manchester-Essex Regional Middle School, located in the same building as both the Manchester-Essex Regional High School and the previous Manchester Middle School.

The town of Essex does not include a high school, and in years past has had to send its grade 9 through 12 students to neighboring districts. Arrangements in the past have included sending high school students to Manchester-by-the-Sea, Gloucester and Hamilton-Wenham public schools. In 2000, the town approved a plan to create a regional school district with Manchester-by-the-Sea. Under the plan, the two towns are served by a consolidated school system, the 'Manchester-Essex Schools', and a new high school. This marks the first time Essex did not have to send its students to another district to attend high school.

In early 2006, the voters of both Essex and Manchester by the Sea approved a new $49 million regional school project for the purpose of building a new Middle School and High School. Both projects were approved at Town Meeting and then again at the ballot box for a debt-exclusion which will permit the towns to raise funds in excess of the 2.5% property tax cap mandated by Prop. 2.5. A similar $36 million plan three years earlier was defeated in Essex at the polls and approved in Manchester. Construction is not expected to be completed until 2010. No start date has been established as of April of 2006