Three Ventura County campuses have made Newsweek's list of the nation's top high schools, but some local educators say the list provides an incomplete picture of what makes a successful student.

Newsweek released its annual "America's Best High Schools" report last week, and 1,300 made the list.

Schools were ranked by a basic formula, called the Challenge Index. It involves taking the total number of Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate tests taken by all students at a school and dividing it by the number of graduating seniors.

In Ventura County, Westlake, Oak Park and Newbury Park high schools made the list, ranking 201, 435 and 460, respectively.

To be included on the list, schools had to have at least as many AP or IB tests taken in 2007 as they had graduates. The top 100 schools were featured in the magazine.

Tony Knight, superintendent of the Oak Park Unified School District, said that while Oak Park High administrators and teachers are proud of the recognition, there are other important factors.

"We believe in multiple measures of success," Knight said. "About 98 percent of our students go on to college, and that's a part of our attention and focus. We encourage all of our kids to go to a post-secondary program, and that is valued by our learning community."

Oak Park High Principal Lynn McCormack agreed. "The quality of a great school is not only measured by the number of AP tests students take," she said. "While I am glad we are included, there are also incredible students here who don't take the AP test and have a lot on their plate but do very well academically."

Andrew Rotherham, co-founder and co-director of the Education Sector think tank in Washington, D.C., and Sara Mead, a senior research fellow with the New American Foundation, examined Newsweek's methodology in 2006.

In their study, Rotherham and Mead said the Challenge Index is "a seriously flawed measure of overall quality," and they pointed to "glaring" achievement gaps and high dropout rates at some schools on the list.

"I think schools like to highlight the fact that they are being recognized, because people like lists, and in a lot of cases, it does show accomplishment," said Mead. "There are many schools that are doing an effective job and students are taking AP tests, but there are schools on that list that do not do a good job in educating a significant amount of their students."

But Newsweek contributing editor and Washington Post reporter Jay Mathews, who devised the Challenge Index, said on the magazine's Web site that "teacher quality, extracurricular activities and other important factors are too subjective for a ranked list. Participation in challenging courses and tests, on the other hand, can be counted, and the results expose a significant failing in most high schools — so far, only 5 percent of the public high schools in the United States qualify for the Newsweek list."

Westlake High Assistant Principal Drew Passalacqua said Newsweek's list doesn't include other important measures, including the number of students in Gifted and Talented Education programs and the quality of athletic and performing arts offerings.

Mead said another list, complied by U.S. News & World Report, provides a more accurate picture because it measures schools by several criteria. It looks at student performance in core subjects and on state tests, among other things.

In this year's U.S. News & World Report ranking, several local schools received honors, including Westlake, Newbury Park, Oak Park, Moorpark, Santa Susana, Thousand Oaks and Foothill Technology high schools.

Joe Bova, principal of Foothill High in Ventura, said that while the recognition is "an honor," some schools on the U.S. News & World Report list only admit students with top test scores.

"How can you compare a school that selects kids through a testing process versus a school like ours that has a random (admission) lottery?" Bova said. "That's not a fair comparison."

Bova, however, said making a national list does boost student morale. "We educate the kids about what the rankings are about and the process," Bova said. "It does motivate them, and they take pride in it."