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Ashburnham Westminster Regional School District

serving the communities of Ashburnham and Westminster Massachusetts

Adolescent Mental Health and Substance Abuse Survey 9/18/26

Posted Date: 09/15/26 (11:53 AM)
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Click here for a brief video introducing this letter: https://youtu.be/ecbfdhivUOo

Our team of clinicians and scientists from the Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School is partnering with schools across Massachusetts to improve adolescent mental health and reduce substance use, and we cannot accomplish this mission without the help of you and your child! These are not programs or research projects of Oakmont Regional High School.

Why is this program so important? We are in the middle of a youth mental health crisis. The current generation of adolescents are facing a concerning rise in mental health concerns and substance use that far too often goes undetected or unchecked. Further, the increased need for mental health and substance use services among adolescents far exceeds the resources available at school and in the community.
We partner with schools across Massachusetts and offer therapeutic treatments and education programs for students who may be in need of some extra supports. Additionally, our program aims to discover what makes a young person particularly vulnerable to substance use and other psychiatric concerns. The information your child provides will be invaluable in not only improving our understanding of adolescent mental health and substance use, but also in helping our team develop more effective intervention, prevention, and education programs to help students and families. Previous program participants have found these types of studies to be an informative, interesting, and rewarding experience that provides unique insight on real applications of science and their own behaviors.

Who can participate in the programs? Students who have never used addictive substances (e.g., cannabis and nicotine), students who have used addictive substances, students who are at risk for substance use or mental health concerns, and students who are currently suffering from mental health concerns may be invited to take part in one or more of our projects. Our group places great importance on the study of both mental health concerns and substance use given the high rate of comorbidity between these two conditions.

What does our evaluation program involve? Your student’s high school is participating in another research program affiliated with our Center around improving SBIRT, students at these participating high schools may be asked additional questions up to twice per year during the duration of this program. To learn more about the additional questions your student may be asked during this school year, please click this link: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/gb6964ioespqsnylv9bwf/Opt-Out-Addendum_8.28.25_English.docx?rlkey=wgw594ajgux40xp09o3a2qiqt&st=sdppa3wt&dl=0

School-Wide Assessment:

  • All students at Oakmont Regional High School may have the opportunity to complete a very brief and confidential survey about substance use and mental health.
  • This will take place on September 18th.
  • The survey will take approximately 15-30 minutes to complete.
  • During the survey, your student will be asked about a variety of different things. For example:
    • Basic demographics (e.g., age, race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity)
    • Mental health (e.g., symptoms of depression, anxiety, emotion dysregulation)
    • Substance use (e.g., lifetime and current use of alcohol, cannabis, and nicotine)
    • Other descriptives used to create a unique code (i.e., it cannot be used to identify a student) for allcompleted surveys (e.g., eye color, hair color, LASID, middle initial). These questions may be usedto connect records over time, but this information will not be used to find out your students’ names.  As neither the MGH Research Team nor schools will have the information to decipher the code, the LASIDs cannot be used to identify students who choose to respond to the survey. Additionally, yours tudent’s school will not have access to any of the individual survey responses.
    • Students will have the option to provide contact information if they are interested in hearing aboutany of the other voluntary and confidential clinical research projects we offer through our Center atMGH. If your student completes the survey and would like to hear more about our other programs,we will provide you with more details on the projects available, give you the opportunity to ask anyquestions you have, and require your consent if your student is under the age of 18 before they areenrolled. Depending on the study, consent may be written, verbal, or opt-out.
  • Students will also be given the option to ask our team for a connection to a school staff member toreceive more behavioral health resources at their school. This component is VOLUNTARY.
    • For students who request additional resources, our team will send a designated school staff membera list of LASIDs that requested a connection.
    • Students will be informed that ONLY their LASID (student identification number) will be sharedwith the school staff member.
    • Students’ survey responses will NOT be shared with the school in any capacity.
    • A percentage of students will be eligible to receive a gift card for participating in each survey. Students chosen to receive a gift card (e.g. Amazon, Starbucks, Target, or a local retailer) will beselected at random based on their LASID number. Schools will be notified of selected LASIDs.MGH study staff will not be told the identities of the students who receive the gift cards.
  • An example of the types of questions that may appear in the survey can be found here:https://redcap.link/schoolsurvey2026test
  • If you do NOT want your student to participate in this survey, you must complete this opt-out form https://redcap.link/surveyoptouts2026 by September 17th. There will be no penalty or consequence toyou or your student for opting out of the survey. If the study staff does not hear from you by September 17th, it will be assumed that you consent to your student completing this brief and confidential questionnaire. Even if you do not object to your student completing this survey, your student is in noway required to do it if they do not want to.
  • If you do NOT want your student to participate in this survey and would prefer NOT to use our opt-out link, please reach out to your student’s school directly and reference this letter by September 17th.
Please indicate if you would like your student opted out of the survey by completing this short form https://redcap.link/surveyoptouts2026 by September 17th. 

What about privacy and confidentiality? We ensure that all information provided to us remains confidential. All questionnaires, interviews, and other information provided to us will only have an identification number on them. If your student chose to provide some contact information because they are interested in learning about our other projects offered at MGH, that information will be treated with strict confidentiality and stored securely. No identifiable information your student provides will be available to anyone, including school officials or personnel. Only de-identified data will be shared with collaborators for data analysis. 

How do I find out more information? If you would like to learn more about our research program, please reach out to Dr. Randi Schuster at (617) 643-6673 or Rschuster@mgh.harvard.edu. 

We look forward to partnering with you!