Lying on their stomachs on Moulton Elementary School’s grassy lawn, two students grappled in a friendly arm wrestling competition to the cheers of other students before the morning bell rings one last time.
Surrounding the competitors, other students in the Des Moines pre-K through fifth grade school wrapped up games of tag or hugged their parents goodbye as they left for their last day of school on Thursday, June 4.
By 7:30 a.m., staff and roughly 400 students filed into the mural-covered interior of the 112-year-old school scheduled for demolition in November.
In early 2027, construction will start on a new arts academy to take its place. It will be among the first and largest projects in Des Moines Public Schools’ five-year Reimagining Education project to improve facilities and programs.
Heather Towne, a special education associate and Des Moines native, said she is ready to see Moulton go, even as she teared up at the thought of how deserving the neighborhood is of a new school.
“I think it’s overdue,” Towne said. “I look forward to seeing how much we can build on it for the children. … Education is always evolving. Humans are always evolving. So you know, we got to stay up to date.”
Moulton’s principal, Eddie McCulley, who spearheaded the school’s beautification project, said it was like “putting lipstick on a pig,” given the building’s leaky windows and roofs. District officials have said one one of Moulton’s exterior murals will be reused, but what happens to the rest of the art in the building remains unclear.
While it was difficult to see the colorful walls for the final time, students at Moulton deserve a school that is beautiful and functional, said Kathleen Davenport, associate principal.
“Obviously there’s a lot of memories that come with this building,” Davenport said. “So, I think that’s hard, right? But those memories still exist even though the walls are going to come down.”
After Moulton students spend two years at the Kurtz Opportunity Center during construction, they will return to College and Eighth street site in the fall of 2028 to the new Moulton Arts Academy for PK-eighth grade.
“What we’re going to get when we come back is going to be this state-of-the-art building that our kids deserve, this neighborhood deserves and our community deserves,” Davenport said. “So it’s going to be worth it in the end.”
Moulton Arts Academy is one of Des Moines Public Schools’ signature schools under the plan, which also offers specific programming ranging from science and technology to dual language to performing arts.
In November 2025, 74% of DMPS voters approved the 20-year, $265 million general obligation bond to pay for the project, which also covers classroom and learning space additions to dozens of the district’s schools.
Additionally, officials are slated to continue expanding the all-day, 4-year-old preschool program and add sixth-grade classes to elementary schools.
With 71 buildings aged 70 to over 100 years old, some buildings need mechanical updates or renovations to better serve the district’s project, said Rainey Briggs, chief of operations for DMPS. For that reason, the district will repurpose dozens of schools, while three buildings will be retired over five years.
Altering the district’s footprint will help with “strategic placements” of students across Des Moines, said Bekah Harris, project manager for the bond that made it happen.
“It’s about aligning our schools, programs and facilities so students can explore their interests, build skills and prepare for the future,” Harris said.
Walnut School celebrates its final day
The same morning, more than 200 students, wearing matching purple shirts with the Walnut Street School tiger on them waved goodbye, filling the streets surrounding the school that is also being retired this year.
On its last day, students stood on the block surrounding the school, eating ice cream, petting goats and donkeys, bouncing in inflatables, and throwing balls at a tank filled with ice-cold water in hopes of dunking teachers.
“We keep saying that this is not just a building, it’s a family,” Katie Briggs, Walnut Street’s instructional coach who served the school for 14 years. She’ll be teaching kindergarten at Greenwood Elementary.
Students and teachers from Walnut Street will be sprawling across the school district. Some teachers are going to Greenwood. Others to Edmunds Elementary.
Most students will go to Edmunds, but some, like 7-year-old Nuriah Mohamed, will be split up from their friends. Nuriah will go to Cowles Montessori School, where she will only know her younger sister, Adaliah, and her uncle, who is 13.
“I’m gonna be a little shy,” Nuriah said.
While Nuriah was petting a donkey, her mother, Hawa Isaak, said she had attended Walnut Street and hoped her children could do the same.
“I was hoping that they could have gotten a few more years at Walnut,” Isaak said of her daughters. “But, unfortunately, now they can’t.”
Walnut Street School started as an early child learning center while housing administrative offices for the district. After talks of selling the six-story building, district officials settled on returning it to office space for Des Moines Public Schools.
“Our students are very sad to see each other, but we’re hoping that we can stay in contact over the years and are finding ways to do that,” Katie Briggs said. “Our relationships are the most important.”
What other facility changes are in store for DMPS?
During 2026, DMPS families will see construction on six schools in the district. Brody, Goodrell and McCombs middle schools will start construction in 2026 on the Career and Technical Education Maker Spaces.
With more middle school CTE spaces planned across the district, these additions could offer an environment for “hands-on learning in fields like robotics, engineering, business and health Harris said.
Middle school Career and Technical Education Maker Spaces will roll out over the course of four years, starting with Brody, McCombs and Goodrell opening in 2027-2028.
The exact details of PK-8 signature school programming will be finalized in 2027 after a community feedback session. No programming changes occur during the 2026-2027 school year.
“The visions are super high-level,” Harris said. “We really specifically didn’t dive into the curriculum, the staffing, because we didn’t want to get too far for the community to come back and say ‘this is not what we want for our kids.'”
After the first round of projects is completed, families could see the Reimagining Education program implementation start as early as the 2027-2028 school year. The Moulton Arts Academy could open in its new building as early as 2028.
Weeks Middle School will add six new classrooms. Work on new classroom additions to Lovejoy and Studebaker elementaries are slated to start in fall 2026. Both of those two schools are still in the design process, according to a presentation from the district on June 1.
What has happened since DMPS passed the Reimagining Education Bond?
Summer will be the busy time for Des Moines Public Schools and its construction department.
Since securing the $265 million bond, school officials have started obtaining building permits and the design phase. Four construction projects have already completed the design process, three of which are additions to middle schools dedicated for career exploration.
The Moulton Arts Academy and two elementary classroom additions are under design and will break ground in the fall.
The district started a month-long public feedback process to inform the final plans. Over the summer, a committee of community members will develop recommendations for future school boundaries. Transportation planning will begin once the new boundaries are established.
During the 2026-2027 school year, the district will finalize the PK-8 signature school programming and start developing curriculum, staffing plans, and school schedules.
“Our community has indicated that they stand behind us in ensuring that our students have opportunities, access and also families have opportunities and access to utilize our facilities in a way that allows them to learn,” operations chief Rainey Briggs said. “Not only within the district, but also preparing them for after high school.”
Kate Kealey is the growth and development reporter for the Register. Reach her at kkealey@registermedia.com or follow her on Twitter at @Kkealey17.
Kyle Werner is the breaking news and public safety reporter for the Register. Reach him at kwerner@registermedia.com.
Reporting contributed by Samantha Hernadez.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Moulton, Walnut’s final bell: What DMPS school closings mean now
Reporting by Kate Kealey, Kyle Werner and Samantha Hernandez, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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By Kate Kealey, Kyle Werner and Samantha Hernandez, Des Moines Register | USA TODAY Network
