First in a series on the geography of, and changes to, rural Iowa school districts in the past 55 years, with emphasis on the last 15.
For nearly 50 years the number of places in Iowa where one high school served an area greater than 350 square miles could be counted on two hands. But as rural counties were drained of population and schools continually told to do more with less, whole-grade sharing and consolidation would send this number soaring in the early 21st century.
In this series, here are some things to keep in mind: A township is 36 square miles, a “3-by-4” county like those along the second-southernmost tier in Iowa is ideally 432 square miles, and a square “4-by-4” county is ideally 576 square miles. When the state of Iowa was first settled, a one-room school would typically serve one township. For more background on that era, there’s “Remembering One-Room Schools,” The Goldfinch, Fall 1994.
In one fell swoop in 1960, Davis County went from 62 districts including 48 one-room schools to one covering 474 square miles. Because Western Dubuque is actually a two-high-school district (Cascade is the other), the high school in Bloomfield covered the most geographic space in the state until 2012. Other long-lived large districts are Howard-Winneshiek (1960), Allamakee (1960), and Fairfield.
Maple Valley-Anthon-Oto broke the 350 barrier with a whole-grade sharing agreement in 1993. Mount Ayr followed in 1998 by absorbing part of Grand Valley and Van Buren did the same in 2002 with all of Fox Valley.
In 2005, a rarity in the whole-grade sharing process happened: The tiny CAL and Dows school districts, unable to make whole-grade sharing continue, went their separate ways. Dows searched for a new partner and ended up with Clarion-Goldfield. The new CGD was bigger than Fairfield. In the following decade, breakups of long-term whole-grade-sharing districts would become more common.
On July 1, 2006, 46 years after Davis County formed, the number of high schools covering 350-plus square miles stood at eight.
Then the floodgates opened.
Some information about Davis County’s consolidation comes from an October 1961 Associated Press article. UPDATE 1/21/22: Corrected year of Davis County’s formation.