Iowa Code §280.32 (the Gail Orcutt School Radon Safety Act, HF 2412) requires every public school attendance center in the state to test for radon by July 1, 2027, then every 5 years after that, and to publish the results on the district's own website. Districts aren't required to send results to any state agency, and there's no public statewide database — so we're tracking what districts have actually published, district by district, starting with the largest.
Statewide · sourced
Most districts that have tested haven't published
A Midwest Newsroom investigation (October 2025) found that of roughly 350 Iowa public school districts covered by the mandate, only 151 had tested by that point — and of those, just 81 districts had actually published their results, despite the law requiring it. The state won't check before the deadline: the Iowa Department of Education says its first look will be its fall/winter 2027 desk audit, when it will confirm that each district tested and posted its results. A district found out of compliance is assigned corrective action with a deadline, and if that isn't met the case goes to the Iowa State Board of Education.
Sources: Iowa Public Radio / Midwest Newsroom, October 1, 2025 (the 151 and 81 counts; we haven't independently re-verified them, so they're cited as that reporting). Desk audit and enforcement steps: Iowa Department of Education, Bureau of Communications, email to RadonScout, November 9, 2026, citing Iowa Code §256.11, subsections 10 and 11.
District tracker: Iowa's 25 largest districts
25 districts · checked 2026-11-06
Of Iowa's 25 largest public school districts by enrollment, seven post radon test results on their own websites. Two more post only a testing plan, and sixteen show no results we could find. Iowa Code §280.32 requires each district to publish its results on its own site, so that's where we look. Districts are ranked by 2025–26 enrollment (Iowa Department of Education).
1. Des Moines Public Schools
Results posted27,591 students
A 269-page lab report covers 69 buildings and 6,510 readings from November 2011 to May 2025. By our count, 35 of 68 buildings had at least one room at or above 4.0 pCi/L in their most recent full round of testing; the highest was 11.8 (Harding Middle School, March 2022). Twelve buildings on the district's own 2024–25 testing schedule show no test after June 2020 in the report.
Room-by-room results from November 2025 and March 2026, plus retests in March and May 2026. Seven rooms in five buildings were still at or above 4.0 pCi/L at their latest posted test. Detail below.
Nine buildings reported so far on a rotating schedule, as counts of rooms rather than readings. Brookview Elementary had 5 of 64 rooms and Grant Ragan Elementary 1 of 66 at or above 4.0 in early 2024; both were fixed with ventilation and filter changes and retested below 4.0 on average. The five buildings tested in December 2024 had none.
The district says it tests every facility on a four-year rotation with Linn County Public Health and posts the plan (buildings and test-kit counts by year, file dated February 2025). We found no test results on the district site.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · test plan PDF
5. Sioux City
No results found on district site13,527 students
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
Sioux City, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · district site
6. Ankeny
No results found on district site12,440 students
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
No test results found on the district site. The district has a radon policy (804.07, adopted August 2023) that restates the state's testing and retest rules.
No test results found on the district site, which shows only its radon policy (adopted fall 2022). Local radio reported in June 2025 that every school was tested in January 2025 and that, after ventilation changes, two rooms (underground custodial offices) were still high; no readings were given.
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
West Des Moines, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · page checked
11. Council Bluffs
Results posted7,581 students
Reports for seven buildings tested so far on a rotation. In January 2024, Lewis & Clark Elementary had 13 rooms at or above 4.0 pCi/L (highest 8.7), Bloomer Elementary 5 (highest 7.1, a basement office) and Abraham Lincoln High 3 (highest 4.9). After HVAC adjustments, all were below 4.0 when retested in December 2024. Carter Lake, Edison and Longfellow elementaries and Thomas Jefferson High had no reading at or above 4.0 in January 2025.
No test results found on the district site. A 2019 district news post said every site was being tested and that results would be shared as they became available.
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
Bettendorf, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · district site
16. Cedar Falls
No results found on district site5,565 students
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
Cedar Falls, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · district site
17. College Community
No results found on district site5,504 students
No radon page or test results found on the district site.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa · checked 2026-11-06 · district site
18. Marshalltown
Results posted4,929 students
Three years of reports covering eight schools and three district buildings, as counts of rooms rather than readings. Lenihan Intermediate needed two mitigation systems after simpler fixes didn't bring its rooms below 4.0 pCi/L; Rogers Elementary was mitigated and Woodbury Elementary fixed with ventilation changes, and both retested below 4.0; four high school rooms (of 121) averaged below 4.0 on retest in 2023. The other buildings tested in 2024 had no rooms at or above 4.0.
Reports for seven buildings tested in November and December 2025, about 390 locations in all. None was at or above 4.0 pCi/L; the highest was 3.6 (Sawyer Elementary). Ames High School isn't among the posted reports.
The district's radon plan, approved September 23, 2026, says every school gets its first baseline test in November 2026, with results to be posted on its facilities page. No results yet.
Spreadsheets posted in May 2026. The high school (147 readings, March 2026) and middle school (110 readings, April 2026) had no reading at or above 4.0 pCi/L; the highest was 2.8. The elementary file covers four schools with five to seven rooms each, mostly cafeterias and gyms, tested in September 2024; all were under 1.0.
No test results found on the district site. A January 2021 district notice said Oviatt Elementary was being screened for radon; no results were posted.
"No results found" means we searched the district's own website (its site search and its linked pages) and found no posted results on the date shown. It does not mean the district hasn't tested: results can sit in board meeting packets or in files a site search doesn't cover, and the deadline isn't until July 1, 2027. These are the 25 largest districts, not a sample of all Iowa districts. If you work for one of these districts and your results are posted, tell us where and we'll update the row.
Iowa City CSD: what the district's own results show
21 rooms · 10 buildings · tested Nov 2025 – Mar 2026
Iowa City Community School District posts its radon test results directly on its own site. These are the individual room readings at or above the EPA action level of 4.0 pCi/L from the two most recent test batches, tested by Shive-Hattery (a licensed Iowa radon measurement provider). Sorted highest to lowest.
Under §280.32, a reading at or above 4.0 pCi/L requires a retest within 60 days. The district has since posted retests (March 2026) and a second follow-up round (May 2026), shown beside each building above. Each building's most recent posted retest is shown; a room that isn't in a later report is described by its last posted reading, and the posted reports don't say whether mitigation work was done. Checked 2026-11-06. We also pulled an older 2022–2023 batch of Iowa City CSD results, but that extraction was AI-assisted from scanned PDFs and hasn't been manually verified against the source documents, so we're holding those specific numbers back rather than publishing anything we haven't checked.
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