About Us

The Guthrie Center Community School District serves the community of Guthrie Center and the
surrounding rural area. The district encompasses the west central portion of Guthrie County and has an
area of 180 square miles. Four bus routes transport students to two educational centers.

The junior-senior high school, grades 7-12, is located at 906 School Street in the southeastern area of
Guthrie Center. The building was originally built as a high school in 1975, and when the old Guthrie
Center Jr./ Sr. High School was closed in 1993, a new addition containing the junior high wing was
added. During the summer of 2010 major renovations occurred. The junior-senior high school offers a
range of courses and various extra-curricular activities designed to involve all students. The K-12 district
has made a concerted effort to focus on school to career initiatives. Grades 7-12 reflect an innovative
scheduling process using a block 5 configuration.

The elementary school is located at 900 N. 4th Street in the northwestern area of Guthrie Center. The
facility was built in 1959 and went through major remodeling in 1996 with the addition of classrooms on
the lower level and again in 2010 with the installation of air conditioning and new doors and carpeting.
Students in Pre-K through 6 are organized into self-contained classrooms with the full range of Special
Education, Talented & Gifted, Title I Reading, and Reading Recovery programs available.

Guthrie Center Schools, K-12, are accredited by the North Central Association Commission on
Accreditation and School Improvement. The district is the first school in Iowa to achieve “exemplary”
capacity for the NCA “Transitions Endorsement” for school improvement.

Last year 566 students were served by 54 full and part-time teachers. In the district 35% of students were
eligible for free and reduced lunches. The majority of students were Caucasian.

No private or parochial schools exist in the district. Twenty-six students were open-enrolled out of the
district and 82 students were open-enrolled into the district. Twenty-eight students were home-schooled.

Although the community is largely dependent on an agricultural economy, several businesses have been
added to the community in the last ten years