One of the few small districts in Iowa still maintaining buildings in three different communities is closing one of them.
Southeast Warren’s intermediate school in Lacona, which holds grades 4-6, will close at the end of this school year. KCCI had a story October 31. I called the school board secretary to get clarification on the timeline.
There is an elementary in Milo and the high school is in Liberty Center. Football games are played in Lacona, and in January the superintendent said the district would want to keep the gym facility there. (It’s able to be separated from the main building.)
The district held a meeting in February to go over the plans. A drop of 35 students in enrollment translates to a loss of $262,500 in state money. In May, the board voted to close Lacona and move sixth-graders to the high school. The Indianola Independent-Advocate said the closure would be after the 2024-25 school year, but this is incorrect. The minutes from May 10 are fuzzy on the wording.
The district still doesn’t know where it’s going to put some of those students. In October, a board member talked about a walkthrough of the primary (soon to be elementary) and day care buildings “to brainstorm ideas to add classroom space for the 4th and 5th grades next year.” As of Halloween, some parents were worried the school would close its day care in Milo in order to put intermediate students in that building.
Southeast Warren is also considering a different type of cost-saving measure, implementing a four-day school week.