The Little Hawk

05/09/2025

LH SPORTS POD:
Rito, Owen, Jack and Jack bring the latest sports news from City High.

XC teams ranked in Top 5 - Boys Golf wins Back to Back Meets - City Football Works to Rebound against Bett

Your donation will support the student journalists of Iowa City High School. For 2025, we are trying to update our video and photo studio, purchase new cameras and attend journalism conferences.

05/09/2025

Good Morning City High!

Avery and Stevie bring you the top stories of the week from City.

Your donation will support the student journalists of Iowa City High School. For 2025, we are trying to update our video and photo studio, purchase new cameras and attend journalism conferences.

03/09/2025

🎬 The Movies You Might Have Missed Over the Summer
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From Superman to How to Train Your Dragon, here’s your guide to the summer films that flew under the radar — the good, the bad, and the totally skippable.

Ben Haines ✍️
Read the full Column on TheLittleHawk.com 🦅

03/09/2025

Abigail Burns Finishes 2nd and Cross Country Wins Hillcrest Invitational
Varsity finished with a score of 20 and JV swept the race with a perfect score of 15. Lucy Sherburne won the JV race with a time of 22:15
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✍️ Martha Willard
Read more on TheLittleHawk.com 🦅

03/09/2025

Abigail Burns Finishes 2nd and Cross Country Wins Hillcrest Invitational

Varsity finished with a score of 20 and JV swept the race with a perfect score of 15. Lucy Sherburne won the JV race with a time of 22:15.

Photo Story by Martha Willard

Your donation will support the student journalists of Iowa City High School. For 2025, we are trying to update our video and photo studio, purchase new cameras and attend journalism conferences.

29/08/2025

Girls Cross-Country 5th in Pre-Season Ranking
By Martha Willard

City High Girls Cross-Country finished eighth at state in the 2024 season and is looking to improve their standing and maintain the first place conference finishes in the JV and Freshman-Sophmore division. “I would really love for us to get top three at State. I think that’s a really high-reach ...

28/08/2025

Girls Cross-Country 5th in Pre-Season Ranking
Members of the City High girls cross country team talk about the upcoming season.
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City High Girls Cross-Country finished eighth at state in the 2024 season and is looking to improve their standing and maintain the first place conference finishes in the JV and Freshman-Sophmore division.
“I would really love for us to get top three at State. I think that’s a really high-reach goal for us, but it’s something we should strive for,” Abigail Burns ‘26 said. “I also want us to win the conference in all three divisions. We won it in JV and Fresh-Soph last year, and then we got second in varsity.”
Burns is a returning varsity member and team captain. She was one of the fastest runners on the team last season and placed 24th in the 2024 state race. City High JV and Fresh-Soph have both been conference champions in the past two years. 
“We get a lot of JV runners that come and put in work in the summer, and it pays off. When the gun goes off they’re going to take care of business, they’re going to race hard and get themselves up into the front,” Coach Ryan Ahlers said. “Girls that maybe aren’t scoring on JV, they’re working hard and trying to hit PRs.”
The first meet of the season is the Hillcrest Invitational on September second. In 2023, City High won the Varsity race with a 37 point margin and in 2024, they won by 45 points.
“I’d love to win it again. That was really nice to have the team just totally dominate. It’s just really fun to see that and it especially helps motivate us for the rest of the season,” Burns said.

Read more on TheLittleHawk.com 🦅

26/08/2025

📸 Picture Day is TOMORROW!
Don’t forget — students will take their photos during English class on August 27.

👩‍🎓 Seniors: Even if you don’t have an English class, stop by the library to get your picture taken.

✨ Bonus: Seniors can DM for a FREE senior photo session!

09/06/2025

Two games vs. Prairie and Little Hawks Baseball Club taking the field in between. Come out and support‼️ ⚾️🔥

Photo & Graphic 📸: Kelsey Herrig

05/06/2025

🧠💥Big news! “Brain Drain” was officially selected as a Best of SNO Story of the Year for 2024–2025!

Super proud to see this incredible piece get the recognition it deserves.
Check it out on thelittlehawk.com and Best of SNO!

Congratulations Lily on the amazing work!

03/06/2025

An A+ For C Students
Grade Inflation is on the rise
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Years ago, a City High teacher felt pressured by students, parents and administrators to curve subjective tests–these are tests that couldn’t be auto-graded–more harshly. In response, their grading policy changed to reflect the increasing demands of students who wanted higher grades for the same quality of work. This is an example of grade inflation, a phenomenon where average letter grades go up without an increase in student understanding. 
According to the ACT, grade inflation is when the letters grades given do not match with students’ knowledge and mastery of content. Mastery is how well students learned the information they were tested on and how well they can continue to use it. So if students get an A but cannot truly apply the information, that is grade inflation. Evidence of whether or not students have mastered content usually comes from standardized test scores like the ACT or ISASPS. The SAT is not as helpful because it is graded on a curve and so the scores depend on who takes it and what they get. 
From 2010 to 2022, the average high school GPA rose in all subjects, but the growth is most pronounced in math, according to the ACT. In 2010, it was 3.02, and in 2022, it increased to 3.32. As well as average GPA, the average percentage of As has increased as  the number of B’s and C’s has decreased.
Though grades have increased, ACT scores from 2010 to 2022 have remained mostly the same, with a 0.6 decrease from 21.3 to 20.7. The biggest deficit was in math, with 1.2 points lost. The increase in average GPA paired with the steadiness of ACT scores shows that although letter grades have increased, student proficiency of national standards has not.
High school standardized test scores in math have also decreased, according to the Nation’s Report Card. From 2013 to 2019, the percentage of Grade 12 students below the basic level of achievement in math went from 35 to 40. The percentage of students below basic achievement for reading across the same time frame also went up from 25 to 30.

Story by Martha Willard
Graphic by Lily Rantanen
Read more on TheLittleHawk.com

03/06/2025

City High Boys Soccer fell 0–1 to Ames in a hard-fought quarterfinal match at the state tournament last night. The Little Hawks battled until the final whistle but couldn’t break through Ames’ defense.

📸 Stella Demarest & Preston Mensah

Read more on TheLittleHawk.com