From the KCRG-TV9 Newsroom:
Changes could be coming for students looking to apply to the University of Iowa. It comes after a record-breaking numbers of students applied this school year. Brent Gage, the university’s Vice President for Enrollment Management, says the school needs to ditch the current process–that could also include bringing back standardized testing. The Iowa Board of Regents first waived the ACT or SAT requirement for all of Iowa’s public universities during the pandemic in 2020. It’s unclear if the university would be able to make the ACT or SAT a requirement for applicants once again. It may be up to the Iowa Board of Regents to reinstate it.
A new study from the University of Iowa and the ACLU says automated license plate readers are tracking Iowa drivers, with little to no statewide rules on how that data is collected or used. The research found more than 48 agencies in Iowa use these cameras, including some cities with dozens of devices that capture vehicles. The ACLU says that data can feed into national databases without drivers ever knowing it’s happening. They also point to a roughly 10 percent error rate, raising concerns about misidentifying drivers. The ACLU says it hopes the findings spark more legislative action, or at least a pause on adding more cameras, until Iowa sets more consistent rules.
Iowa House Republicans will keep the supermajority in the legislature after a special election in Northwest Iowa. Wendy Larson beat her Democrat opponent by 40 points in Tuesday’s election. She will represent District 7, including Sac, Pocahontas, and Calhoun counties. The seat was open after former Representative Mike Sexton resigned to take a job in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Republicans lost their supermajority in the Senate in the last special election.
We’re seeing numbers for the first time which show the challenges in Iowa’s economy in recent months. Iowa Workforce Development released its employment data for September of this year, numbers that were delayed due to the federal government shutdown. The state did see a decrease in the unemployment rate from August to September this year…but compared to last year, the unemployment rate has actually increased by four tenths of a point from September 2024 to September 2025. More than 8,000 more people are unemployed in Iowa than a year ago.
