The 2023 Lynnfield Public Schools Youth Health Survey found that 49% of Lynnfield High School students and 25% of Lynnfield Middle School students are experiencing mental health problems.
Rebecca Millock of John Snow Inc., the public-health consulting firm that conducted the survey in collaboration with A Healthy Lynnfield and the district’s nursing staff, presented its findings during a recent School Committee meeting.
Lynnfield Middle School Assistant Principal Jeremy Greenwood said that the data was not surprising to him.
“The thing that really stands out for me is certainly the concern around mental health,” Greenwood said. “That continues to be an issue. Four years and one day ago, the world shut down for a health crisis, and we still haven’t come out of that mental health crisis that came as a part of that.”
Lynnfield High School Assistant Principal Mike McLeod said that the data will be useful going forward and allow the the school to improve.
“Substance abuse, which then leads to mental health, is huge right now,” McLeod said. “I feel like every other civics project coming in is substance-abuse related, and wanting to talk about how to prevent it.”
Lynnfield Public Schools Nurse Coordinator Toni-ann Rebelo spoke about the mental health problems many students in town experience.
“It’s really alarming how on a daily basis, our kids perceive their mental health as not being in a good place, particularly female and LGBTQ students,” Rebelo said. “We see that every day in the nurse’s office, the volume of kids coming in with anxiety, depression, panic attacks, you name it. It is constant and continuous.”
Another notable finding was that 15% of middle school students and 15% of high school students reported being bullied on school property in the year before the survey was conducted. The percentage of high school students has increased consistently since 2017 and is slightly higher than the 2021 results for the state as a whole.
Greenwood then talked about the restorative justice work that Lynnfield Middle School has been doing to repair the harm caused by bullying within the community.
“Looking at the data, it looks like at least for some students, the restorative work is not really working out,” School Committee member James Dillon said.
Greenwood replied that the school is still in the early stages of the restorative justice work.
“I also think that some mental health issues with students might be because they are being bullied in some cases,” Dillon said.
According to the survey, 10% of middle school students and 15% of high school students were bullied electronically, 11% of high school students have experienced emotional dating violence or control, and 18% of high school students reported experiencing depression in the year before the survey was conducted.
