Berkeley to send letters for possible transfers

Students attending at least 13 Berkeley County schools will have the option to transfer to higher-performing schools next year through the federal No Child Left Behind law.

The school district will send roughly 7,100 letters to parents of children who attend those 13 schools beginning on Monday. The letter informs parents that their child's school fell short of meeting Adequate Yearly Progress for the same reason in two consecutive years. Those schools therefore are required to offer transfers as a sanction associated with the law. All choice transfer requests must be made by July 18.

Twelve schools offered transfers during the current school year, and only 291 students requested new transfers. But 653 students who requested transfers in prior years remained at their choice school.

Students have not yet taken this year's batch of standardized tests, so district officials had to project which schools would be on next year's transfer list in some cases, said Sheldon Etheridge, Berkeley's director of federal programs.

Read more in tomorrow's editions of The Post and Courier.