The annual health and wellness survey will take place March 5 during assembly period. 

Students will be separated by grade to take the survey. Ninth graders will be in Gordon Parks Assembly Hall, sophomores will be in Judd C116, juniors will be in the Sherry Lansing Theater and seniors will be in Café Lab. 

Students are asked to bring their phone to take the survey, and encouraged to avoid sitting next to friends while taking the survey due to comments last year about feeling pressure to answer a certain way. Teachers will help enforce this at each location.

There are multiple reasons for the wellness survey.

“To me, the primary purpose is to give a voice to the student experience,” Deputy Title IX Coordinator Betsy Noel said.

The results of this high school survey will be used to modify assembly content and sexual education curriculum and to develop ways to reduce stress.

Ms. Noel said these statistics are shared with parents and may bring to light subjects that students may not find comfortable discussing with their caretakers.

Last year’s survey showed that students use music to relieve stress, which was part of the reason more musical opportunities were placed throughout the school, like putting a piano on the patio outside the high school building and playing music in Judd. 

Ms. Noel has also put up posters in response to last year’s results to increase conversation within the community.

“Increasing the conversation may temporarily increase stress and strife as we process this information but will ultimately create an overall better environment,” Ms. Noel said.

According to Ms. Noel, last year, the health and wellness survey had many revisions done to it but this year that she wants to start receiving more consistent data so only a few questions were added. The changed questions will focus more on social and emotional parts of student’s lives and a specific question on harassment that was taken out last year due to a coding issue.

Ms. Noel believes “shining a mirror” to the student body will help peers better understand each other and thinks that it is useful for students to know how their companions feel.

“Students deserve to be heard, and not just the voices that are the loudest,” Ms. Noel said. “The loudest voices may not represent the majority of the student body, and both perspectives are important.”