When it first opened in 1968, this school had 5 building blocks that housed classrooms, a Science Laboratory, an Industrial Arts Workshop, a dormitory building, a library, offices and a canteen. The lack of classrooms and other facilities caused the school to hold two sessions at that time, namely the morning session and the afternoon session.

    This problem was overcome in 1973 after getting an additional building block and the following year another additional building block was erected with a large hall. In 1981, a hall known as ASPURI was built. There is also a principal's house built within the school grounds. Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Dato' Abdul Rahman Ya'kub has been a mixed school for boys and girls since its inception until now. Until 1970, this school only accommodated students from the literature stream. Starting from that year, a fourth grade class in the Science stream was created. In 1978, this school began accepting transitional class students from SRJK (C) and SRJK (T) from around Merlimau. Two transitional classes have been created to accommodate approximately 75 students from the two schools. The result of the Malaysian Certificate of Education, which is getting more encouraging year by year, allowed this school to hold Form Six literature for the first time in 1981. The first group of 33 students of Form Six Literature started studying in a class in May of that year. This year it has increased to four classes.

    In parallel with the addition of students, the number of students in this school also increases   from year to year.  When it first opened in 1968, this school had only 36 teachers and the number has now increased to 115 people. While the support staff has increased from 5 people to 34 people.

    In 1997, SMKDARY was given the trust of JPM through the Islamic Education Unit to open Religious Flow classes (KAA). A total of two classes are open up to Form 3. After that students can continue their studies in Form 4 KAA at another school. In 2001, SMKDARY got a two-storey building block that housed two comfortable computer lab rooms considering the large number of students. In 2004, SMKDARY opened the MPV Senireka Tanda stream for PMR graduates and then opened the MPPPU stream (Air Conditioning and Air Conditioning) in 2008. girls also have 4 teacher's houses.