If you’ve been in the boys’ bathrooms at Rio Americano High School, you know they’re not exactly the most private places on campus. From broken stall locks to a lack of spacers between urinals, these bathrooms could use some serious improvements.
First, multiple stalls don’t even have locks on them. This is a big issue because it means people can accidentally walk in on you while you’re using the bathroom. Having a lock is such a simple thing, but without it, it makes the bathroom experience stressful. Nobody wants to keep their foot pressed against the door just to make sure no one barges in.
Another privacy issue is the lack of spacers between the urinals. Without spacers, there’s no barrier between people, which makes things uncomfortable. Most people press themselves as close as possible to the urinal to make sure nobody can see anything. But honestly, it shouldn’t be this way. Adding spacers would give everyone the privacy they need and make the whole experience less awkward.
Privacy aside, there’s also the issue of supplies. The soap and paper towels in the boys’ bathrooms seem stocked only about half the time. Part of the problem is that some students have made a habit of destroying or removing the soap and paper towels from dispensers, making things harder for everyone else. Sometimes, you have to search every dispenser just to find a bit of soap. This is more than just annoying, it’s also a hygiene problem. Everyone deserves to have soap and paper towels available so they can clean up properly.
Voters in the San Juan school district just approved $950 million in school repair and construction bonds. Along with updating classroom spaces, the funds will also go toward essentials such as roof and plumbing repairs, removing lead and asbestos, and potentially enhancing campus bathrooms. This measure could finally bring long-awaited updates to Rio Americano’s bathrooms, creating a cleaner and more private environment for students.
But we shouldn’t have to wait for bond money for basic inexpensive fixes like fixing locks, adding spacers and keeping supplies full.
In a school as big as Rio Americano, we should have bathrooms that feel safe, clean and private. Improving the bathrooms might seem like a small change, but it would make a big difference to everyone who uses them.
