MANKATO — Mankato Area Public Schools are seeing mixed results with the release of the new Minnesota Student Survey.
The survey, released every three years by the Minnesota Department of Education, asks area fifth, eighth, ninth and 11th graders a variety of questions from activity participation to school safety to mental wellbeing and more. Statewide, results show that students tend to feel safer and more welcome at school than in 2022 and 2019.
St. Peter Supt. Jon Graff says that trend is encouraging when it comes to getting students ready to learn.
“Students, and arguably all humans, have an innate need for connectedness. If this need isn’t met, the need to fulfill it gets in the way of learning in the same way that feeling hungry, too hot, or too cold is distracting,” he said.
However, in Mankato, results are mixed: 88% of freshmen say they feel safe at school, an increase from 2022 (84%), but it still doesn’t reach pre-COVID levels, dropping from 92% in 2019. That trend is the same compared to juniors in high school, with 87% reporting feeling safe in 2025 compared to 83% in 2022 and 90% in 2019.
The trend reverses somewhat for freshmen reporting that their teachers care about them either somewhat or quite a bit, with this year’s 60% representing a drop from 2022’s 68%, but an increase from 2019’s 56%.
Not every district takes part in the survey, but Mankato Schools Director of Teaching and Learning Travis Olson says that, for the district, the information is invaluable.
“We’ve participated consistently in this survey, and the results we get, both for our district specifically and to be able to look at that in comparison to the state, helps us to make informed decisions about the needs of our students,” he said.
Disparities
The survey reveals that more work can be done, particularly along racial lines. According to the results, about 63% of white freshmen say their teachers care about them either somewhat or quite a bit. That’s almost 20% higher than the mark for Black students (45%) and about 7% higher than the mark for Hispanic/Latino students (56%).
All of those gaps stay consistent throughout high school, according to the survey, with similar numbers of high school juniors reporting their teachers care about them either somewhat or quite a bit.
The gaps increased in this year’s survey, as the gap between white and Black students on the same question was almost nonexistent in 2022 (68% for the former, 67% for the latter) and was only separated by 7% in 2019.
It also contrasts with state results, which see about 64% of white freshmen saying their teachers care either somewhat or quite a bit about them, compared to about 58% for their Black peers and 60% for their Hispanic peers.
This comes without any major demographic shift in the district, with Black students accounting for about 15% of high school freshmen in both 2025 and 2022.
Another gap exists in this category for a different minority group — that between cisgender and transgender students.
According to the survey, around 61% of cisgender high school freshmen in Mankato report their teachers care about them either somewhat or quite a bit compared to 48% of their transgender peers saying the same thing.
It’s a stark contrast, especially for a district that saw basically no difference in reporting between transgender freshmen and their cisgender peers in 2022 and 2019.
Another split between cisgender and transgender students exists when reporting whether they feel safe at school. Ninety percent of cisgender freshmen report feeling safe, compared to just 75% of their transgender peers. That’s a gap that’s always existed, with those numbers being 85% and 79% in 2022 and 92% and 85% in 2019.
These disparities between racial and gender minorities are something the district is aware of, Olson said, and they’re trying to address it.
“We know that the experience for all kids is not the same and we continue to work to be able to help kids feel welcome, feel connected (and) to feel safe in their school setting. … (We’re focusing on) what do we need to do differently for that (to happen), because all of our kids deserve a great opportunity when they are in school each and every day,” he said.
One reason for that split could be that transgender students are much more likely to get bullied; 53% of transgender freshmen in Mankato say they get bullied at least once a month, with 31% saying bullying is due to their sexual or gender identity.
Meanwhile, just 26% of cisgender freshmen say they are bullied at least once a month, with the primary reason being size or physical appearance.
Anxieties/drug use dropping
Statewide, there are causes for celebration in this survey. Only 14% of freshmen say they feel “down, depressed or hopeless” more than half of the week over the past two weeks. That’s lower than both 2022 (21%) and 2019 (18%). That decline is matched at the district level, with 15% of freshmen in Mankato reporting the same for 2025, a lower mark than 2022 (20%) and one that’s even with 2019.
Meanwhile, in Mankato, 23% of freshmen reported feeling “nervous, anxious, or on edge” more than half the days in a two-week span, compared to 32% in 2022 and 21% in 2019.
“We’ve made some real investments in supporting our students. … We have our chemical dependency counselors to help kids and when chemical dependency becomes an issue in their life, and then just overall a real attention by our staff to support kids and feeling connected to school and helping them to be successful in school each and every day,” Olson said.
The survey also reports a general statewide decline in smoking and alcohol use. According to a story in the Star Tribune, students believes energy drinks may be the reason. “Now they sell them at school,” St. Paul Central senior Naomi Carter said.