Nevada Community School District
242 titles banned · Iowa
Books with Full Pages
A Court of Frost and Starlight
A Court of Mist and Fury
A Court of Wings and Ruin
A Stolen Life
Empire of Storms
History Is All You Left Me
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Identical
Impulse
Kingdom of Ash
Looking for Alaska
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
More Happy Than Not
Slaughterhouse-Five
Sold
Speak
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
The Bluest Eye
The Color Purple
The Fault in Our Stars
The Handmaid's Tale
The Hate U Give
The Lovely Bones
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Thirteen Reasons Why
Tower of Dawn
Tricks
All Banned Titles
About Nevada Community School District
Nevada Community School District serves the city of Nevada, Iowa, the county seat of Story County in central Iowa. Nevada (pronounced nuh-VAY-duh locally) is a small city of approximately 6,800 residents situated about 35 miles northeast of Ames and roughly 45 miles from Des Moines. The district enrolls approximately 1,500 students across an elementary school, a middle school, and Nevada High School, home of the Cubs. Story County as a whole is home to Iowa State University in Ames and tends to be more politically mixed than much of rural Iowa; the town of Nevada itself, however, is primarily agricultural and working-class in character.
Nevada Community School District is a modestly sized district where the local school board has historically played a direct role in decisions about library and instructional materials. The district’s small size means that a concentrated group of engaged community members can have significant influence on school board decisions.
Books in Schools
Nevada Community School District recorded a notable number of book restrictions driven primarily by Iowa’s Senate File 496, signed by Governor Kim Reynolds on May 26, 2023. The law required school districts to remove from school libraries any books containing descriptions or visual depictions of sex acts, effective July 1, 2023. Districts were directed to complete reviews of their library collections and remove non-compliant materials before the school year began. Iowa became the first state to require book removals rather than simply allowing local review processes.
Nevada Community School District complied with SF 496, removing titles across its schools that were flagged under the law’s standards. The resulting list of removed titles included widely assigned young adult novels, award-winning fiction, and books that had been in school libraries for years without prior challenges. The district’s removal count, while large relative to its enrollment, was consistent with the pattern seen across rural and suburban Iowa districts of similar size following the law’s implementation. A legal challenge to SF 496 was filed in federal court, and portions of the law were enjoined pending litigation.