Transfer Into Ashland School District

We had a conversation the other day with the principal of the Ashland High School. And the main topic was what to do if we had a client looking for a house and was unable to find the suitable property in the Ashland School district…yet the client still wanted their children to attend Ashland Schools.

There are 2 ways to attend Ashland schools if you live outside of the school district.

The first way is the Inter-district transfer. The school district one would be leaving would have to approve letting the student leave in addition to the Ashland school agreeing to let the student in. This approval has to be approved every year. The main reason the schools would allow this is if there was a program or course that was not offered in the school one was leaving, but was offered in the Ashland school. One example would be orchestra. I don’t believe it is offered in the Talent-Phoenix district, but is offered in Ashland.

The other way is Open Enrollment. The school district that you are leaving has no say in letting the student leave under this way. And, under open enrollment system once the student is accepted in the Ashland school district, the student is in it until they graduate. It does not need to be applied for every year. Enrollment for the coming year opens on March 1st, and I think she said closes on April 1st. There are a number of spots available in most grades. However, if they do not get enough applicants, then they will have to reduce the number of spots.

As it was explained, and this primarily affects the middle school open enrollment process, is that if enough people want to transfer in, then they can hire additional staff. But if not enough interest is shown, then the added students would increase class size and the school doesn’t want that.

But it sounded like the elementary schools and high schools would almost certainly take all applicants from Open Enrollment.

More information can be found on the school districts website.