Governor Kim Reynolds and the Iowa Department of Education announced Wednesday that four Iowa schools have been selected as the state’s inaugural Iowa Blue Ribbon Schools for 2025. Formerly the National Blue Ribbon Schools, the program is now a state-led recognition initiative, honoring some of the state’s top-performing schools. Braynt Elementary School in Dubuque is one of Iowa’s inaugural 2025 Blue Ribbon Schools. Iowa’s four designees were honored as Exemplary High-Performing Schools, which are measured by state assessments or nationally normed tests. Each of these schools performed in the top 15 percent of all Iowa public schools based on overall performance on school accountability indicators, including student proficiency and growth.














