We have received official notification from Dr. Tom Lane, Executive Director for Iowa’s AEAs, that language calling for an AEA reorganization will not move forward in any bill during the 2018 legislative session. We understand that some legislators heard from their constituents about the impact an AEA reorganization could have on services to Iowa’s students, families, schools, and communities, and they have stricken any language mandating a change in our system design this legislative session. Therefore, the AEA system will remain at nine entities and not move to the proposed seven.
We remain focused on what is best for Iowa’s students, families, and schools. The AEA chief administrators continue and strengthen our commitment to begin work on improving our collective service quality, parity and efficiencies and will continue to contract with Dr. Susan Leddick to facilitate discussions around this work when we convene in June.
This announcement provides Iowa’s AEAs with an opportunity to study, reflect and determine an action plan to meet the changing needs of our districts while continuing to seek efficiencies and sharing opportunities across the AEA system.