Assistant superintendent presents 2025 MIYHS results; board highlights safety, screen time and access to substances

Assistant Superintendent Meg Parkhurst presented results from the Maine Integrated Youth Health Survey (MIYHS) to the Saco School Board on Dec. 10, reviewing trends across middle and high school bands and noting both positive indicators and areas needing deeper study.

Parkhurst said the survey — administered statewide and returned to districts in aggregate — is anonymous and confidential. “It’s anonymous and confidential so there’s no way to ever tie any information back to a specific student,” she said while describing the dataset and its limitations. Parkhurst reported counts of 175 sixth‑grade respondents and 322 students in the combined seventh/eighth grade band from Saco schools in the spring 2025 administration.

Key points Parkhurst identified included lower‑than‑state‑average bullying rates and high reported family support (about 93 percent). She highlighted increased physical activity among middle schoolers — more than half report exercising at least five days per week — and suggested expanded programming may be paying off. At the same time, Parkhurst flagged several areas for follow‑up: a drop in sixth‑grade students reporting they “feel safe at school” (from 94 percent in 2023 to 87 percent in 2025 for that cohort), a rise in screen time, and an online bullying trend that, while still below the state average, has increased locally.

Parkhurst told the board the district will use the results to seek grant funding and set targeted goals: "It's a really important metric not only for helping schools identify strengths and areas for growth, but also in pursuing grant funding opportunities," she said.

Public comment from Ann Marie Swenson of Thornton Academy underscored limits on data sharing: Swenson told the board that Thornton Academy would not share its full MIYHS database with Saco because the survey is anonymous and TA’s student body includes a substantial share of non‑Saco students. “TA is not comfortable sharing the complete database at this time for 2 reasons … because the survey is anonymous, we are unable to separate Saco student responses from those of the over 40% of our students who are not from Saco,” Swenson said.

Board members asked for additional context and requested that administrators analyze safety and bullying responses in greater depth. Parkhurst clarified that the state provides combined percentages for grade bands (for example, seventh/eighth combined and ninth through 12th combined) and does not supply responses disaggregated by single grades, which limits some comparative breakdowns the board sought.

Parkhurst said the administration will return with goals and potential interventions informed by the MIYHS data, and noted the district plans to pursue grants and community partnerships to address the priorities identified in the survey.