Wikipedia

List of school districts in Iowa

See also: Category:School districts in Iowa

This is a list of school districts in Iowa, sorted by Area Education Agencies (AEA). Districts are listed by their official names, though several schools use "Schools" in their name or website rather than "Community School District". As of July 2020, this list has not been expanded to include former school districts.

Background edit

In the early 1900s the state had 4,873 school districts. The state government passed the Consolidated School of Law of 1906 and this figure fell to 4,863 in 1908, 4,839 in 1922,[1] and 4,558 in 1953.[2] That year some additional laws were passed that contributed to reducing this further, and so this fell further to 458 as of July 1, 1965; that year another law made providing a high school mandatory for a school district,[1] which meant school districts that had one room schoolhouses were required to consolidate.[3] The deadline for such mergers to be finalized was April 1, 1966, with mergers themselves to occur on July 1 of that year.[4]

By July 1, 1980, the number of districts was down to 443.[5] In 1984, there were 437 school districts in the state that operated high schools.[6] In 1990 the total number of school districts was 430.[5] In fall 1995 the number of school districts operating high schools was down to 353, and in 1995 670 was the median enrollment K-12 of an Iowa school district.[6] An Iowa Department of Education consultant named Guy Ghan referred to the 1990s school district mergers as the "third wave".[7]

The total number of school districts was 365 on July 1, 2005.[5] In the 2016–2017 school year there were 333 school districts, an 11% decrease from the same figure in 2000.[8]

Circa the 1980s school districts began agreements to share resources, such as particular employees, or "whole grade sharing" (where students of one or more grade levels are sent to a different school district to get their education). In 2005 Tom Vilsack, the Governor of Iowa, proposed that requirements for school districts to have certain numbers of students or sharing employees as ways of reducing local government spending, though Vilsack never enacted those requirements. In 2007 Josh Nelson of The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier wrote that "Lately, consolidation hasn't been as big of an issue compared to previous years."[3]

By 2016 population losses in rural areas have fueled further school district consolidations.[9] By 2017 there had been school districts that had formed from different generations of school consolidations.[10]

Central Rivers AEA edit

Black Hawk County edit

Bremer County edit

Buchanan County edit

Butler County edit

Cerro Gordo County edit

Chickasaw County edit

Floyd County edit

Franklin County edit

Grundy County edit

Hancock County edit

Hardin County edit

Marshall County edit

Mitchell County edit

Powesheik County edit

Tama County edit

Winnebago County edit

Worth County edit

Wright County edit

Grant Wood AEA edit

Benton County edit

Cedar County edit

Iowa County edit

Johnson County edit

Jones County edit

Linn County edit

Washington County edit

Great Prairie AEA edit

Appanoose County edit

Davis County edit

Des Moines County edit

Henry County edit

Jefferson County edit

Keokuk County edit

Lee County edit

Louisa County edit

Lucas County edit

Mahaska County edit

Monroe County edit

Van Buren County edit

Wapello County edit

Wayne County edit

Green Hills AEA edit

Adair County edit

Adams County edit

Carroll County edit

Cass County edit

Clarke County edit

Decatur County edit

Fremont County edit

Harrison County edit

Mills County edit

Montgomery County edit

Page County edit

Pottawattamie County edit

Ringgold County edit

Shelby County edit

Taylor County edit

Union County edit

Wayne County edit

Heartland AEA edit

Audubon County edit

Boone County edit

Carroll County edit

Dallas County edit

Guthrie County edit

Jasper County edit

Madison County edit

Marion County edit

Polk County edit

Shelby County edit

Story County edit

Warren County edit

Keystone AEA edit

Allamakee County edit

Chickasaw County edit

Clayton County edit

Delaware County edit

Dubuque County edit

Fayette County edit

Howard County edit

Winneshiek County edit

Mississippi Bend AEA edit

Cedar County edit

Clinton County edit

Jackson County edit

Louisa County edit

Muscatine County edit

Scott County edit

Northwest AEA edit

Cherokee County edit

Crawford County edit

Ida County edit

Lyon County edit

Monona County edit

O'Brien County edit

Osceola County edit

Plymouth County edit

Sioux County edit

Woodbury County edit

Prairie Lakes AEA edit

Buena Vista County edit

Calhoun County edit

Clay County edit

Dickinson County edit

Emmet County edit

Greene County edit

Hamilton County edit

Humboldt County edit

Kossuth County edit

Palo Alto County edit

Pocahontas County edit

Sac County edit

Webster County edit

Wright County edit

See also edit

References edit

  • Anderson, Christopher L. (2009). School District Reorganization in Iowa: Considerations for Administrators, School Boards, and Communities (PhD thesis) (PDF) (Dissertation). Drake University.

Reference notes edit

  1. ^ a b Anderson (2009), p. 18
  2. ^ "DISTRICT NAME CHANGES". Iowa Department of Education. Archived from the original on October 3, 2005. Retrieved March 7, 2021.
  3. ^ a b Nelson, Josh (March 11, 2007). "School ties". The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier. Retrieved April 25, 2021.
  4. ^ "Deadline nears for non-high-school areas". Cedar Rapids Gazette: B1. March 20, 1966 – via NewspaperArchive.
  5. ^ a b c "REORGANIZATION & DISSOLUTION ACTION SINCE 1965-66" (PDF). Iowa Department of Education. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 27, 2020. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
  6. ^ a b Siebert, Mark (September 17, 1995). "Survival of the littlest". The Des Moines Register. pp. 1B, 8B.
  7. ^ Bloom, Elizabeth (October 29, 1995). "Consultant thinks school consolidation phase nearing an end". The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier. p. B4.
  8. ^ Patane, Matthew (April 30, 2018). "How we got here: School consolidation leads to 11 percent drop in number of districts". The Gazette. Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
  9. ^ Vujicic, Aleksandra (May 29, 2016). "More rural Iowa school districts plan to close their doors". The Des Moines Register. Retrieved March 7, 2021.
  10. ^ Duffy, Molly (February 20, 2017). "Iowa school districts cope with when to consolidate - and when to stand alone". The Gazette. Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Further reading edit

External links edit

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