CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Students in a northeast Iowa school district can sign up for sports teams, but they might not have anyone to compete with next year. That’s because the Decorah Community School District (DCSD) will operate as an independent during the 2025-2026 school year, after the Northeast Iowa Conference dissolves at the end of the 2024-2025 school year.

KCRG-TV in Cedar Rapids reports that at a school board meeting Monday night, the resounding feeling was that the process in place has not worked for this district at all.
Iowa law states every district is entitled to belong to an athletic conference. The Iowa Department of Education denied an appeal from DCSD to switch to the Upper Iowa Conference. The state denied that request saying the high school’s enrollment size is more than double the average enrollment of other schools in the conference.

If the district had joined the WaMaC conference, that would have meant teams traveling close to 300 miles round trip for some competitions. District officials said at Monday’s meeting that athletic competition schedules are created 2 to 3 years out, and it’s “preposterous” to start making one on a much shorter timeline.

Officials said school year 2025-2026 had been determined by default, so what they’re doing now is working on a solution for the 2026-2027 school year.

The conference changes do not affect football.