I have completed more than 40 public murals around the country, though the majority are in Iowa. I’ve experienced “Iowa Nice” to be a real thing. In Clinton, the mayor drove me around and gave me a tour of the city after finishing a project there. While painting, people stop to chat and bring you cold drinks and snacks. In Webster City, the mayor had a dinner party for me, and personally installed the panels with a lift. If I’m painting in a big city, these things don’t happen—you just show up and do your job.

The Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities is excited to announce that our students and faculty will be working in Bondurant and Dubuque during the 2023-24 academic year. We are grateful for the many strong applications submitted last spring. The selected communities provide unique opportunities for University of Iowa students to apply their learning through hands-on projects that will benefit the state of Iowa.

On Thursday, May 4, the Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities (IISC) capped off its year-long partnership with the community of Clinton, Iowa. Seven student groups made presentations, followed by a ceremony that included awards, remarks, and a documentary film screening.

As Master of Public Affairs (MPA) students participating in the IISC program, Payton Colbert and Maggie Schnurr shared a student perspective. Both Colbert and Schnurr worked with the IISC partnership in Clinton. “I study policy and what makes it work and what makes it fail,” Schnurr says. “I think that it’s important to evaluate policy not just by standards of 'does it work' but by looking at 'who does it work for?'"

One of the most cross-disciplinary classes on campus is actually two classes that have opted to combine forces. Travis Kraus teaches Community Development through Creative Placemaking in the School of Planning and Public Affairs, while Loyce Arthur teaches Action! Engage! Art! Creative Placemaking for the Public Good in the Department of Theatre Arts. Undergrad and graduate students from those departments, as well as political science, dance, engineering, and public health meet to discuss creativity and equity in placemaking.

The mural was made possible by the Maquoketa River Watershed Management Authority. Through an Iowa DNR watershed planning grant, they enlisted the help of the University of Iowa’s Initiative for Sustainable Communities program, which takes students out of the classroom and into communities to complete real-world projects.

For their capstone project, graduate students in planning and sustainable development have spent the year conceiving a new life for an area at the western entrance of Clinton, IA. The group sought public input during design charrettes in order to come up with four concepts for the narrow land that was once the site of a railroad repair shop.

The University of Iowa’s Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities program, or IISC, will bring more than 20 student-led projects to the City of Clinton by the end of the academic year. The program allows students from a range of disciplines to develop and share ideas to help advance a community’s goals. This year, the IISC partnered with the City of Clinton.

Original designs for a new pocket neighborhood in Maquoketa, IA, were created by University of Iowa Civil and Environmental Engineering students in conjunction with the Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Studies’ (IISC) partnership with the East Central Intergovernmental Association (ECIA). The homes in the development are affordable and help the community increase its housing stock.