Every year, thousands of teachers in Florida transfer from one school to another. And if a recent St. Petersburg Times review is any indication, a solid majority of them are following a well-worn path to schools with fewer poor students.

You'd think that might merit some coverage, right? But no. A search of Florida newspapers by Times researcher Caryn Baird found barely a dozen stories about teacher transfers in the past decade. That's about one a year. For the whole state.

None of them took a detailed look at the trends. But some of them at least raised concerns about the impact on students.

"The schools with the most need are always in a flux of training the inexperienced teacher," a school board member told the Florida Times-Union for this story in 2002. "The sharing of teacher attrition should be shared at all schools. Right now, the same schools are bearing all the burden and it must stop."

Hmm. When's the last time you heard that around the Tampa Bay area?

- Ron Matus, state education reporter

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