codebook.md

Codebook — NBA draft × high school pathways panel

File: data/nba_draft_hs_panel.csv
Unit of observation: one drafted player-pick (typically 60 per draft year).

Columns

Column	Type	Description
draft_year	int	NBA draft year (2016–2026 in this release).
pick	int	Overall pick number (1–60 typical).
round	int	1 if pick ≤ 30, else 2.
player_name	string	Player name as in source.
nba_team	string	Drafting franchise abbreviation (Basketball-Reference). Empty for curated 2026 if not yet joined to a team table.
college_or_prior	string	College, G League, or international club / pathway listed as prior stop.
high_school_finish	string	Finishing secondary school / academy (last U.S. HS or prep program competed for). Empty if unknown or no U.S. HS.
hs_city	string	City/town of finishing school when available.
hs_state	string	U.S. state (name or postal abbr) or intl / non-U.S. label.
school_type	enum	See definitions below.
school_type_method	enum	How school_type was assigned (see below).
ambiguity_flag	string	Non-empty when classification is contested or pending review.
notes	string	Free-text caveats, prior schools, tuition citations (curated rows).
place_median_hh_income	number or empty	ACS 2024 5-year median household income for HS city/place (public rows; see data/public_hs_town_income.csv). Ecological town proxy — not family income.
state_median_hh_income	number or empty	ACS 2024 5-year state median HH income (paired with place income for public rows).
hs_source	string	Provenance of HS attribution.
bbref_player_url	string	Basketball-Reference player URL when scraped.

school_type definitions

Mutually exclusive finishing-school buckets (same rules as the 2026 case study):

Value	Meaning
public	U.S. public district or public magnet high school.
local_private	Catholic / Episcopal / Christian / independent day school that is not a national boarding / prep magnet.
elite_prep	National boarding prep, postgraduate academy, or alternative academy pathway used as finishing school (e.g. Link, IMG, Montverde, Oak Hill, Brewster, Wasatch, Overtime Elite, Sunrise Christian, Compass Prep).
international	No U.S. high school finish (overseas club / federation / academy pathway).
unknown	U.S. finishing school named (or missing) but not yet hand-reviewed for public vs local private; or HS attribution missing.

Do not treat unknown as a substantive pathway category in papers — it is a data-quality status.

school_type_method

Value	Meaning
curated_hand	Human-reviewed (2026 case study). May include public / local_private.
curated_override_csv	Matched sources/curated_overrides/school_type_overrides.csv (name+state; web-sourced).
auto_international_no_us_hs	No U.S. HS on source and/or clear overseas pathway.
auto_elite_prep_dictionary	Finishing name matched curated elite-prep dictionary (scripts/classify_school_type.py).
pending_public_private_review	U.S. HS present; public vs local_private not assigned.
missing_hs_attribution	No finishing school string available.

Important measurement notes

1. Finishing school, not birthplace or first HS. Prior stops (e.g. public → Link Academy) do not change the bucket.
2. No invented schools or types. If sources disagree, keep the BBRef/curated finishing name and flag ambiguity.
3. Income columns are optional and currently sparse (2026 public-HS towns only).
4. 2026 coverage may reflect a hand-built first-round-scale slate from the case study; confirm against the official NBA draft board when locking a paper sample.