NATCHEZ — A website report listing Natchez High School as the seventh worst high school in the nation has one Natchez alderwoman seeking answers from both the company that created the report and local school officials.

Ward 1 Alderwoman Joyce Arceneaux-Mathis expressed her concerns about the report last week at a Natchez Board of Alderman meeting.

NeighborhoodScout.com published the report. The website claims to be a research and data mining company that publishes nationwide reports on crime, school and real estate.

Arceneaux-Mathis questions the company’s credibility.

“I retired from teaching at Natchez High School, and I did 30 years with the Natchez-Adams School District, so I know what kind of kids we have out there and the scores they make,” Arceneaux-Mathis said. “I want to know who is this company releasing this information, what their track record is and what the criteria was for this ranking?”

Information on the website purports the site uses a “patent-pending” formula to compare schools and school districts across state lines based on test scores from the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federally-mandated state tests.

The NCLB Act of 2001 requires states to develop assessments in various skills and administer those assessments to all students at different grade levels to receive federal school funding.

The website claims that since students in different states take different NCLB assessments, comparing those results across the nation is “generally inaccurate and unreliable.”

The website’s formula incorporates a second test, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which is administered to representative samples of students rather than the entire national, state or district populations.

The main NAEP assessment is normally administered in fourth and eighth grade at the state level and 12th grade at the national level. A nationally representative sample of approximately 10,900 12th-grade students from nearly 480 schools participated in the 2012 assessment.

The NAEP does not report school or student-level results, but instead the results are aggregated at the state or national level.

NeighborhoodScout.com subtracts the percentage of students in the state who scored proficient or better on the state NCLB test from the percentage of students in that state who passed the NAEP and uses the difference to align each school and district’s test scores across the nation, the company’s website claims.

NASD Superintendent Frederick Hill said he has heard community members discussing the report, but had not reviewed it himself.

Hill said, however, he did not believe the report’s information was accurate.

“I refuse to believe that’s an accurate list because I know for a fact there are schools performing worse than Natchez High in Mississippi,” Hill said. “I don’t think that information used to create the list is reliable.”

Natchez High School received an F rating in the state’s accountability results last year.

The state accountability model that grades and rates schools uses a system of A through F to rate schools.

Hill acknowledged the website’s report was causing concern among community members, but said he hopes citizens rely on accurate information to hold the district accountable.

“They have every right to be concerned because it is a failing school,” Hill said. “We’re working to improve the district in order to turn out a good product that the community can support and believe in.”

Arceneaux-Mathis said she and other aldermen expressed interest in meeting with the school board to discuss the report and get more information about the district’s plans to improve.

“I have specific concerns for the children in this city,” she said. “When things like this come up, I want to understand why and what we’re going to do to fix them.”