The nature of campus bathrooms isn’t sitting well with students or staff. There are concerns about student behavior, facility quality, and bathroom policies from out of order stalls and entire restrooms.
“Bathrooms at school have become sort of a hang out place that can lead to vandalism, noise and lack of cleanliness,” campus supervisor Tammy Wiedmann said.
The 15-minute policy prohibits students from leaving class to use the bathroom in the first and last 15 minutes of class.
The reason for this policy, “is to help teachers take attendance. Students should be in class when the bell rings, not loitering in the bathrooms,” Wiedmann said.
There was “a huge [plumbing] backup at the end of the school, and so I knew at that moment there was an underlying issue of throwing stuff into [the toilets] that’s not supposed to,” custodial plant manager James Ortiz, said about his first day of work in mid-November.
When the plumbing was cleaned in November, Ortiz said out of the foreign objects that were found in the plumbing there were 28 vape devices, a calculator, pencils, and a phone charger.
The current out-of-order bathrooms are “because students have continued to throw vapes out” Ortiz said. Due to the costliness of plumbing companies, “as of right now, we’re just gonna be down a bathroom.”
There is presently only one girls, one boys, and the gender neutral bathrooms open during class.
This, “isn’t the best option whatsoever because then it causes a lot of hassle and it could fill up,” senior Diego Lopez said.
While students say the number of available bathrooms and expected time given, is not realistic to use the bathroom, administration’s perspective is different.
“We don’t have all the bathrooms open all the time, because… students need to be in class, and the break times are the times when students should be as much as possible using the bathrooms,” Principal Diana Nguyen said.
Broken locks, bent doors, and vapes in urinals in the boy’s restroom make the bathrooms “not accessible” Lopez said.
“It gets kind of kind of disgusting, and also it is kind of uncomfortable when it comes to it. But yeah, it’s just, it’s just horrible in general.”
Nguyen says there are always plans to get the out of order bathrooms repaired.
“But part of it has to do with funding, availability of the vendors. And so, yes, there are plans, but the timeline is… I don’t know what the timeline is right now,” She said.
As a result, students may have to walk across campus to use the bathroom and possibly wait in line once they get there- which may be 1-5 people deep.
Many female students say they don’t feel comfortable using the gender neutral bathroom. Some out of preference but a to like students kicking down stall doors while someone is using the stall.
In these incidents there were consequences, but “unfortunately, things cannot always be prevented” Nguyen said.
“We can’t always control every single person,” Nguyen said.
Another concern for students is the absent mirrors in the bathrooms, the only exception being the ones in the locker rooms.
“I feel like that’s kind of dumb,” Lopez said. “I literally just use my phone and fix whatever I need to with the camera… but I feel like mirrors are a priority in bathrooms.”
Nguyen says, “The reason that the mirrors were removed from the bathrooms is that they were causing a significant distraction to students. And so it was causing an increase in students being tardy to class… And so at this time, there are no plans to bring them back.”
The root of the issue remains in debate, whether it’s not enough bathrooms open to students during class or because of student treatment of the bathrooms.
“The students are forgetting that this is their second home.” Ortiz says.
“You’re not gonna throw your used tissues on the floor or throw your trash on the floor when you go to your bathroom at home.” Ortiz said “If we all did a little part of that, I think the bathrooms would be so much cleaner, much nicer.”
