Should NV join a different activities conference?

The landscape for high school activities is changing as small school conferences in Southwest Iowa are looking at their present and future membership.

The Western Iowa Conference recently extended an invitation to 10 schools about the possibility of joining their league. Nodaway Valley and Southwest Valley of the current Pride of Iowa Conference are on that list of 10 schools.

Current members of the WIC are Missouri Valley, Riverside, Audubon, Treynor, Logan-Magnolia, IKM-Manning, Underwood, Tri-Center and AHSTW. Current members Audubon and IKM-Manning were extended offers to join the Rolling Valley Conference. As of Monday, Audubon had accepted that offer and will join the RVC in 2027.

The other schools invited by the WIC were Adair-Casey/Guthrie Center, Panorama, West Central Valley and Earlham from the West Central Activities Conference, Red Oak and Shenandoah from the Hawkeye 10 and MVAOCOU and Westwood of the Western Valley Conference.

The WIC came up with criteria for those invitations based on geographic location, school enrollment, activity offerings, district stability, football classification, and facilities availability.

Ames and Des Moines Christian leaving their conferences to join the Little Hawkeye Conference in central Iowa has seemingly set off a flurry of potential moves. In a press release dated June 16, the Nodaway Valley Community School District sent out a press release acknowledging that an invitation to the WIC was received.

“The district has until August 1, 2025 to make an official decision regarding interest in this opportunity,” Nodaway Valley Activities Director Sara Honnold said. Honnold will lead the coordination of meetings with Nodaway Valley coaches to gather feedback, assess levels of interest and evaluate the potential advantages and challenges of a conference change.

Shortly after receiving the invitation, Honnold sent out a survey to everyone in the activities department from athletics, band, speech, FCS, academic and music bowls, ag activities among others, and to coaches and sponsors of those programs. On the chart were questions regarding staying or going, ranking things like travel and strength of schedule and how important is it for programs to have the flexibility to schedule competitions outside of the Pride of Iowa Conference.

“The point of getting input from the programs was that we don’t want to go to a different conference because of this or that reason,” Honnold said. ”Right now, we are not deciding about leaving the conference, but we want to know if we (Nodaway Valley) are willing to have the conversation and let the WIC know we are interested in taking the next steps.

“I was happy with the coverage and the response of the survey,” Honnold added. “It gave me the data I needed.”

The survey did not mention the Western Iowa Conference or possible rumors of an incoming invitation from the West Central Activities Conference.

The next step will be calling a meeting with everyone who received the survey to voice support and concerns and possibly form a consensus so that Honnold and Nodaway Valley can respond to the WIC invitation in a timely manner.

Honnold said that the Wolverines and school district, to her knowledge, are not unhappy, as a whole, with the Pride of Iowa Conference; in fact, she pointed to the fact that the communication between member schools and athletic directors has been tremendous in her short time as the Wolverines’ activities director.

Honnold said that high school athletics is moving into a new era where school districts have to be alert to the changing times.

“If schools don’t take charge of it on their own then people will tell them where they will go. Ames moving to the LHC might have gotten things going. The WIC offer to 10 schools shocked me,” she said.

The Hawkeye 10 Conference has called a meeting for this week to discuss its membership as two members are on the list of 10 by the WIC. Reports late last week suggested four northern Hawkeye 10 schools — Harlan, Denison-Schleswig, Lewis Central and Glenwood — have been sent invitations to join the Missouri River Conference, which has its membership along the Iowa-Nebraska border.

Honnold said she will present data at the next school board meeting and then ultimately send a letter to the WIC with the school district’s response to the invitation. The next Nodaway Valley school board meeting is 5 p.m. July 15 in Greenfield.

To her knowledge, Honnold did not know of any other of the schools who have officially responded to the WIC. In the coming weeks, that could change as schools gauge their interest to stay or go.

“It seems that the WIC is holding things up in a way with movement you hear about from other conferences, but it’s like everyone is waiting for the WIC ball to drop,” Honnold said. “Anything is possible. There are so many moving pieces.”

One benefit of having the survey completed by the activities programs is that if another offer from neighboring conferences comes, Nodaway Valley would be able to get feedback again and possibly sooner.

Honnold did say that outgoing superintendent Paul Croghan has been helpful since incoming superintendent Dr. Pam Stangeland’s first day is July 1. Honnold said that Stangland has been in the loop with everything too so that her first weeks are not even busier covering this discussion.

“We may not find a move to the WIC is a better option, but if we don’t check to see if a move to the WIC is a better option then we (Nodaway Valley) won’t know and we may come to regret that,” Honnold said.

The Pride of Iowa Conference was formed in 1987 with six schools: Interstate 35, Wayne, Central Decatur, Mount Ayr, SE Warren and East Union. That membership was in tact for 13 years. The conference added Nodaway Valley and Martensdale-St. Marys in 1997. In 2000 and 2001, the conference underwent a two-year, four-team expansion plan that brought in Corning (Southwest Valley) and Bedford in 2000 and Lenox and Pleasantville in 2001. Prior to Bedford leaving for the Corner Conference after the 2023-24 school year, there have only been two schools that have left with Interstate 35 and Pleasantville in 2018.

The Western Iowa Conference formed in 1972 and was a merger of two conferences, the Tri-County and Southwest Iowa Conferences. It started as a 12-team conference with Carson–Macedonia, Elk Horn–Kimballton, Iowa School for the Deaf, Shelby-Tennant, Treynor, Tri-Center (Neola), Underwood and Walnut out of the Tri-County Conference and AvoHa (Avoca), Griswold, Missouri Valley and Oakland out of the Southwest Iowa Conference.

After the 1981-82 school year, Elk Horn-Kimballton and Walnut left for the Rolling Hills Conference.

A year later, the Iowa Deaf school dropped out, making it a nine-school league.

Carson-Macedonia joined Oakland to form Riverside and Shelby-Tennant joined with AvoHa to form A-H-S-T. Later Walnut would join to form AHSTW.

In the 1990-91 school year, Audubon joined.

That stability was set until the 2013-14 school year when Logan-Magnolia and IKM-Manning joined.

The last movement before the recent Audubon move was Griswold exiting the league in 2018-19 for the Corner Conference.