“The Senior Survey,” a staple in the Surveyors final issue as well as many Seniors’ memories, is changing due to the new law passed by the Iowa Legislature. On May 26 2023, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds signed into law Senate file 496. This new law now places requirements for schools taking surveys and while many students would consider themselves unaffected by the new law it is quite the opposite.
Since the establishment of The Surveyor in 1958, surveys have been a central component of our high school’s journalism. They have been used to inform current readers of their fellow students and reflect our high school’s culture throughout time. To continue this tradition the Surveyor has annually produced the Surveyor’s “Senior Survey,” which compiles data given by senior students on their lifestyles to reflect the senior class. Over the years the nature of these surveys have changed. In the 1960’s when the surveys initially started simple questions were asked about Seniors decisions about college. As the Surveyor has progressed, so have the questions; with questions like “Have you smoked weed?” or “Have you sent nudes?”. As every issue is released we can see the differences in high school culture, trends, and how we as a society have changed over time.
These more personal questions have now come to end as the new law was passed in May of 2023 by the Iowa Legislature. New Senate file 496 prohibits schools from taking surveys on students’ mental, emotional, and physical health without guardian permission. There is also an additional section about questions being age appropriate. Arguably any question regarding drinking or drug use could be considered not age appropriate as the legal consumption age is past high school. When applying these laws to past surveys it eliminates 41% percent of the questions traditionally asked by the Senior Survey.
Former Surveyor Editor and Chief Abby Throndson weighs in with her experience working on the Senior Survey and why it was so important: “I remember having conversations about removing certain questions from the Senior Survey, but at the end of the day, when we went to talk to students about it, that’s the information they wanted to know, the juicy stuff that [they] could admit to doing on an anonymous survey. I always thought of it as something entertaining for the students at the end of the year.” When asked about her thoughts on the new laws prohibiting a lot of the most popular questions Abby says, “As a former student, I’m a little disappointed that the tradition won’t carry on. Even before I was a senior, I looked forward to looking at the graphs and laughing about them. Not all the questions were about illegal activities and even looking at those responses and those graphs was fun. While the student body might not miss out on much, I still think it was a really fun tradition that I’m sad future classes won’t be able to enjoy.”
While the Surveyor’s Senior Survey isn’t gone for good, it is going to have to make some big changes. New questions will be similar to those asked in earlier surveys of the 60’s. Surveys will be more focused on objective questions such as what students’ plans are for college and what extracurricular activities they have been involved in. While these questions might not be as riveting and “juicy” to the highschool audience they might be able to preserve the tradition for years to come.
