OAKLAND — More than 100 students staged a walkout at Madison Park Business & Art Academy on Wednesday, demanding answers from school and district officials about whether the school’s lack of accreditation would hurt their chances of getting into the college of their choice.

The district informed families by letter Tuesday that it missed an important deadline to secure accreditation this school year from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, a process that ensures schools meet certain nationally recognized academic standards. Because of that, seniors who plan to attend UC or CSU schools will not be able to apply through traditional methods, said Oakland Unified School District spokesman John Sasaki.

The protest started about 9:15 a.m. with a number of seniors leaving class to protest a lack of transparency about what the lack of accreditation would mean, according to a number of students and teachers at the school. They were soon joined by other students, teachers and some parents, spilling into the school’s hallways, main parking lot and outside the front entrance until the school day ended at 1:25 p.m., observers said.

Three district officials, including Bernard McCune, deputy chief of the Office of Post-Secondary Readiness, visited the campus to quell the unrest and hold an impromptu town hall meeting at noon to answer questions from students and angry parents.

“I love my school and my school district, but I just feel misinformed,” Que’Aire Anderson, the school’s student body president, said Wednesday after the protests. “I know it’s under control now, but I just feel people from the community should have had the opportunity to be more involved in the process before it just blew up like it did.”

Anderson said she and a group of other senior leaders organized the protest rally after receiving the letter the day before. The letter explained that a community meeting for families would be held 6 p.m. Thursday at the school, but didn’t answer the questions of many worried students still reeling from the news.

“I thought it was important for students to be heard, so I encouraged a positive protest,” she said.

The school, which serves the Sobrante and Brookfield neighborhoods in Deep East Oakland, transitioned from a middle school to a middle-high school a few years ago. Sasaki said the district missed the deadline to file for accreditation for the new school format, which affected seniors set to graduate this year.

Despite the mistake, Sasaki said it’s not as bad as some people are making it out to be. The school’s lack of accreditation will make it harder for about two-dozen graduating seniors who are applying to CSU or UC schools, out of the 70 to 80 seniors in the class, he said. Students who plan to attend junior colleges, private colleges or out of state colleges will not be impacted. However, a number of school community members, not willing to go on record out of fear of retaliation, questioned if that was really the case.

Students planning to apply to California State University or University of California schools will not be able to use the standard online application system to meet admission requirements, and will instead have to gain admission through examination or by securing an exception, he said.

UC spokesman Dianne Klein confirmed that this was the case, but could not elaborate further on the process. She said she did not have statistics on how many students every year qualify through those exemptions. According to the UC website, students can be considered for admission by test if they earn high scores on the ACT with Writing or SAT and two SAT subject tests, or they can qualify by exception if they can demonstrate their ability and potential to succeed at UC. According to the UC website, the exception is often applied to students who might be “the most creative, focused and intellectually passionate students (but) aren’t able to fulfill our requirements for eligibility.”

And in this way, Sasaki said, it might even benefit the school’s students when they apply.

“Because this is on their radar students that apply from our school could potentially even get a harder look,” he said. “We have been assured by the UC system that it should not adversely affect these students.”

Kurt Kaaekuahiwi, an ethnic studies and leadership teacher at the school, said no one knew there might be a problem with the school’s accreditation until this week. Students came to him distraught and in tears, fearful they might not be able to graduate or be able to attend university, he said.

“Students are very upset. Parents are upset. Teachers are upset, and people are confused,” he said. “Students are exercising their freedom of speech. They feel it was unfair and there was a lack of transparency and accountability at the district about what happened.”

The accreditation committee will visiting the school Friday, and the district hopes it might be able to secure accreditation later this school year, he said.