At the end of last month, Seattle Public Schools released its second annual District Scorecard and its first individual School Scorecards.

The scorecards show the schools’ academic growth, student climate, accountability, family, staff engagement, and overall school performance.

Seattle Public Schools intends to give parents, students and the community important information so we can all learn from and act on the data.

But some numbers have raised questions of data accuracy. Ballard High School as well as the school district as a whole scored surprisingly low in college readiness.

Initially, it was reported that only 17 percent of students in the district are ready for college.

Brad Bernatek, the district's director of research, has confirmed that some errors may have been made in the assessment and evaluation of that statistics and they’re working on gathering more accurate statistics.

“I was disappointed with the numbers because the general public looks at these numbers as the truth,” said Ballard High School Principal, Keven Wynkoop.

“Miscalculations have been formed which create negative perceptions of Ballard High School.”

Wynkoop said that the college readiness is actually around 46 precent.

“This is a complicated issue and mistakes were made on multiple levels,” he said.

Michael DeBell, a member of the Seattle School Board whose children attended Ballard High School said that some errors were made in gathering the statistics.

“It’s simply a mistake in the assessment,” he said. “Ballard is in fact a good and rigorous academic school that has consistently been placing 60 to 70 precent of its students in college throughout the last five years.”

Wynkoop said the timeliness of the assessment caused some of the mistakes.

“By the time our scores were calculated, the evaluation was redefined,” Wynkoop said. “Students were docked for requirements that weren’t in place yet at the time of calculations.”

Wynkoop added that unique programs such as BHS’ BioTech courses were evaluated as Op-Ed classes when they ought to have counted towards science classes.

DeBell said that the timing of the SAT/ACT tests also swayed the college readiness statistic.

“If a student hadn’t taken the SAT/ACT tests early, they weren’t counted towards the number of students taking college admission tests,” he said.

“It’s a brand new assessment and I see this as one of its glitches.”

The statistics are being cleaned up to get more accurate numbers. BHS, like other schools in the district, is using the findings in the reports to develop a School Improvement Plan.

“As long as they’re accurate, I’m more than willing to incorporate these numbers,” Wynkoop said.

DeBell stated that as a parent of BHS alumni, he’s a happy parent.

“It’s one of the best schools in the city,” he said. “Both my sons attended Ballard High School and both were well prepared by Ballard High School.”

DeBell’s sons went on to study at the University of Columbia and the University of Washington.

The Ballard High School Scorecard can be found at http://www.seattleschools.org/area/strategicplan/schoolreports/011.pdf