Every year, schools across California are chosen at random to administer the California Healthy Kids Survey. This school year, Granite Bay High School has been selected.

   The survey is administered to freshmen and juniors and includes a vast amount of questions aimed at making the school environment an overall better place for every individual.

  Several personal questions are included as well – some about topics such as gender preference or sexuality – but participants are given the option to not answer any questions they aren’t comfortable with.

  “Students have the option to not answer some questions or completely opt out taking the survey,” Assistant Principal Gregory Sloan said. “If they have religious purposes or their parents do not want them taking it or whatever it may be, we understand and will leave them be.”

  In Roseville Joint Union High School District, the results of the survey are set to arrive in early January. By using these results, the district hopes to explore new ways to improve the lives of their students.

  There are also staff and parent versions of the surveys, but Sloan said the district doesn’t administer the parent version because they believed many parents would not take it or forget about it.

  “I didn’t even know that parents were able to take it,” freshman Piper Bacon said. “I maybe would have given (the survey) to my parents if I had known.”

  GBHS was to aim for getting 90% or more of students and staff to take the survey, but due to several students either forgetting to take it or simply not wanting to, this goal looks unlikely.

  “I took the survey and that was pretty much it,” junior Andrew Dolan said. “There wasn’t anything hard about it, it mainly felt like a chore.”

  Some students can go through high school and never take the survey due to random chance, such as this year’s senior class.

  Every group of students that come into the school are different, so naturally, survey results are expected to differ as time progresses.
  Overall, the survey intends to provide a general idea to the staff on what the school is doing well with, what it needs more of, and everything in between.

   “In January, we’ll get results back for the survey, and we plan to improve Granite Bay High School as best we can with these results in hand,” Sloan said. “We appreciate everyone who sat down and took time out of their day to take the survey.”