Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t believe some of you are in favor of this. Bathrooms were inaccessible like this when I was in high school and I coped by not drinking any water at all during the day. I had constant anxiety about needing to use the bathroom and not being able to, and also a lot of headaches and digestive issues from being dehydrated.

That’s dramatic. No one in high school in the 90s early 2000s was carrying around a water bottle drinking water all day. We were all fine. No one was have digestive problems and headaches from not carrying around their Stanley all day.

It isn’t that I’m in favor or limiting the bathroom, but I just don’t see it as that big of a deal. You get 20-30 min lunch plus 5 min in between classes. Figure out when to fit in bathroom breaks if you need to. Most heathy teens don’t need to use the bathroom very often. Most teachers grant exceptions too. If this is a problem for your particular student then talk to principal or teachers. But it actually is a reasonable expectation for most students to contain bathroom trips to lunch and passing time- and most kids are fine with this

At that time most people were bringing disposable water bottles. Are you really saying it’s totally normal for a teenager to drink nothing all day until they return home from school and this unhealthy or fine? It was hard to go to the bathroom during the five minutes between classes because they would look the bathrooms, or only lock some but you never knew which would be open.
You all would riot if an office did this to you but it’s ok for teenagers?

Are you stupid? Nobody was carrying around disposable water bottles all day long, weirdo. Shut up.

Class of 98 and we started with Clearly Canadians as the status bottle and ended with Poland Springs. Lots of peach tea Snapple in between.

Yes. At lunch. No one was carrying these around in class. It wasn’t even allowed

Anonymous wrote:Can the federal money go toward new and more bathrooms????

Can some good go to schools?

I hear about bathroom issues a lot from my kids. They just need to use the facilities and it be harassed in there

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At McLean HS, there are a group of boys who hang out in one bathroom and deny entry to any other boys; they even post a “lookout” at the door. Probably vaping in there, or maybe sneaking their girlfriends in for a BJ during a skipped class.

The schools need to actually discipline the kids and then these things wouldn’t be problems anymore.

+1. Are there absolutely no teachers in nearby classrooms or administrators walking the halls who could force the boys denying entrance to the bathrooms to step aside? It sounds as though teachers never leave their classrooms and administrators never leave their offices based on the amount of power students have to close the bathrooms.

Solution: the problem children are accompanied to the toilet by a same-sex truancy officer who can listen to them poop. This is the world they authored with their own behavior. Enjoy boys!

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Anonymous wrote:Wait. If they do not have enough staff for bathroom monitors, then how are they enforcing one child at a time in the bathroom?

The teachers enforce it which means that it only falls on the kids who are good kids and listen to the teachers.

Can you imagine if your employer told you that you couldn’t go to the bathroom because of the possibility that some other people might vandalize the bathroom? You’d be calling the state regulations. It’s ridiculous. The school district has to bear the cost of vandalism — not individual children.

Even with the safety thing, the odds of my kids being caught in a bathroom fight are infinitesimal. The odds of them being uncomfortable and unable to focus on their work because they couldn’t use the bathroom are extremely high.

Can you imagine if you were an employee and you etched racist/profane writing into the bathroom wall, emptied the soap onto the floor, attempted to flushed your vape pen down the toilet, rendering it unusable, and were taking pictures and videos in the bathroom. You’d be fired. We can’t fire kids from school. And good luck expelling.

“Expelling” learners has been repeatedly shown to have a disparate impact on BIPOC learners; it is the very opposite of the goal of economic and racial equity (which is the “E” in DEI).

Public schools need more DEI, not less.

BIPOC learners?

People skipping class to vandalize bathrooms, do drugs in bathrooms, have sex in bathrooms, or otherwise misuse the bathrooms are not learning anything, BIPOC or not.

The learners (BIPOC included) are the ones whose learning experience (and possibly health) is compromised by them not being able to tend to their physical needs.

I think anyone (regardless of ethnicity) who wants to vandalize the bathroom should be removed so that those who want to learn (regardless of ethnicity) will be free to do so. Vandals can be suspended (either in-school with restricted bathroom access or at-home) and provided access to virtual learning should they decide they actually want to be learners. If repeated suspensions prove that they have no interest in learning and the only school activity they will participate in is vandalism, then I agree that expulsion should be an option.

In order to avoid stigmatizing people with destructive behavior, we’ve turned the discipline policy on its end. Instead of punishing troublemakers to hopefully modify their behavior and focus on learning (or at the very least remove their disruptive influence so that those who want to can learn), we now punish EVERYONE, and still have the problem of disruptive behavior. To simply:
Old system - punish the guilty, less disruption and more learning
New system - don’t punish the guilty, more disruption, everyone is restricted/punished, less learning

If you want to help BIPOC learners, focus more on “learner” and less on “BIPOC”.

Anonymous wrote:DD8th came home today and said she was tardy from two of her six classes today due to the school allowing only one kid in the bathroom at a time between classes due to a vandalism incident last week. They aren’t allowed to leave class for bathrooms, either, due to kids abusing the privilege—I guess they are allowed one “emergency pass” per class, per quarter.

So, she was tardy twice because she was waiting in line to take care of her feminine hygiene. Is this something you’d contact the school in regards to? It seems unfairly punitive and ridiculous, especially considering they can’t leave class. I’m unsure how to proceed, but I know she can’t be tardy five days a month.

Anonymous wrote:Here’s an email that came from my child’s middle school on Friday. I appreciate the details and the tone. The guilty kids need to have consequences or the rest of the school is punished instead with restricted bathrooms and insane bathroom limits. For those of you that say suspension is not the answer, what is?

“Over the past few days, we have seen a significant increase in incidents of vandalism and graffiti in our bathrooms and single-stall restrooms. This includes ceiling tiles pulled down, trash cans and soap dispensers ripped off the walls, toilet paper balls being thrown onto walls, ketchup smeared on sinks and walls, and students urinating on the floor and walls.

We have had to shut down several bathrooms, forcing students to walk further to find an open bathroom. This reckless behavior will have a significant cost to repair and those who are found participating, will face serious consequences under the Student Rights and Responsibilities.

We are committed to providing a safe and healthy learning environment for all our students, but students have a part as well. Please talk with your child and remind them to tell a trusted adult if they ever observe unsafe or disruptive behavior at school or the defacing of school property.”

Also, what the heck is wrong with the kids doing this???? I wish they could be forced to scrub up their own mess and work to earn the money to pay back the cost of repairs, but I totally realize that’s impossible.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At McLean HS, there are a group of boys who hang out in one bathroom and deny entry to any other boys; they even post a “lookout” at the door. Probably vaping in there, or maybe sneaking their girlfriends in for a BJ during a skipped class.

The schools need to actually discipline the kids and then these things wouldn’t be problems anymore.

+1. Are there absolutely no teachers in nearby classrooms or administrators walking the halls who could force the boys denying entrance to the bathrooms to step aside? It sounds as though teachers never leave their classrooms and administrators never leave their offices based on the amount of power students have to close the bathrooms.

What makes you think teachers are inthe hallway and not in their room getting ready for the next class?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The WaPo has covered this extensively;

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1186432.page

Bathrooms have to be locked so that vandalism doesn’t occur.

OMG - the Montgomery County schools really LOCK the kids out of the school bathrooms ??

My district does too. Not in DMV. Unfortunately it is more than “a few” kids abusing the bathrooms and the breaks. It is many. They destroy things, trash it, vape, want a pass all the time in every class to meet friends in there (and then stay in there). It is a big problem. Kids are acting feral. Our district opens them during passing time and lunch, otherwise they are locked. You can get a pass on a computerized system that controls how many kids are getting passes in the entire school at that time so too many aren’t out at once and it tracks patterns and times them. They have to clock in and out. I believe they cannot ask for a pass the first or last 10 min of class as well. I have a teen daughter and she hasn’t complained.
She honestly hates using the bathroom at school because of how gross it is

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The WaPo has covered this extensively;

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1186432.page

Bathrooms have to be locked so that vandalism doesn’t occur.

OMG - the Montgomery County schools really LOCK the kids out of the school bathrooms ??

My district does too. Not in DMV. Unfortunately it is more than “a few” kids abusing the bathrooms and the breaks. It is many. They destroy things, trash it, vape, want a pass all the time in every class to meet friends in there (and then stay in there). It is a big problem. Kids are acting feral. Our district opens them during passing time and lunch, otherwise they are locked. You can get a pass on a computerized system that controls how many kids are getting passes in the entire school at that time so too many aren’t out at once and it tracks patterns and times them. They have to clock in and out. I believe they cannot ask for a pass the first or last 10 min of class as well. I have a teen daughter and she hasn’t complained.
She honestly hates using the bathroom at school because of how gross it is

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At McLean HS, there are a group of boys who hang out in one bathroom and deny entry to any other boys; they even post a “lookout” at the door. Probably vaping in there, or maybe sneaking their girlfriends in for a BJ during a skipped class.

The schools need to actually discipline the kids and then these things wouldn’t be problems anymore.

+1. Are there absolutely no teachers in nearby classrooms or administrators walking the halls who could force the boys denying entrance to the bathrooms to step aside? It sounds as though teachers never leave their classrooms and administrators never leave their offices based on the amount of power students have to close the bathrooms.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t believe some of you are in favor of this. Bathrooms were inaccessible like this when I was in high school and I coped by not drinking any water at all during the day. I had constant anxiety about needing to use the bathroom and not being able to, and also a lot of headaches and digestive issues from being dehydrated.

That’s dramatic. No one in high school in the 90s early 2000s was carrying around a water bottle drinking water all day. We were all fine. No one was have digestive problems and headaches from not carrying around their Stanley all day.

It isn’t that I’m in favor or limiting the bathroom, but I just don’t see it as that big of a deal. You get 20-30 min lunch plus 5 min in between classes. Figure out when to fit in bathroom breaks if you need to. Most heathy teens don’t need to use the bathroom very often. Most teachers grant exceptions too. If this is a problem for your particular student then talk to principal or teachers. But it actually is a reasonable expectation for most students to contain bathroom trips to lunch and passing time- and most kids are fine with this

At that time most people were bringing disposable water bottles. Are you really saying it’s totally normal for a teenager to drink nothing all day until they return home from school and this unhealthy or fine? It was hard to go to the bathroom during the five minutes between classes because they would look the bathrooms, or only lock some but you never knew which would be open.
You all would riot if an office did this to you but it’s ok for teenagers?

Yes. Teens can survive until 2:30 having “only” eaten and drank at breakfast and lunch. It isn’t some special ops mission to be able to mange going to the bathroom at lunch hour or passing if you need to. As you can see from the teachers chiming in, it’s a complicated problem that is beyond just couple kids, and isn’t limited to only vandalism. Schools try to limit access to passing and lunch and parents complain, schools try to discipline kids vandalising, parents deny and complain, schools try to limit kids who are seeming to ask for too many passes and are gone too long, parents complain. Schools can’t win.

Serious question, do you only drink liquids at breakfast, lunch, and dinner? I am an adult and I normally drink coffee at breakfast and sip water throughout the day. I normally need to use the bathroom at least twice before lunch, once right when I arrive at the office. Imagine what you would do if an employer told you you could not access a bathroom until lunch time.

No, I don’t continuously sip water throughout the day. I definitely didn’t in high school or elementary school. No one carried water bottles or used the fountains regularly. Besides, it’s not even all day. School gets out at 2:30 or earlier. They are eating and drinking at breakfast and lunch. No one is getting clinically dehydrated in those hours.

It is absolutely crazy town to even begin to contemplate fluid restriction. Adding it to my list of reasons why I homeschool. This is literally abuse and nobody can tell me differently.

Not to mention, people have to poop (sometimes more than once a day!) and girls have menstrual cycles. This is abusive and unhygienic and sex-based discrimination.

Right?? Again I cannot believe some people are condoning this. Human beings need to eat and drink and relieve themselves. High schoolers too!

Female teachers also deal with limited time for bathroom trips when dealing with their period.

My son's school sent kids to the washroom in pairs (planned, one responsible student with one who may struggle) for a while to keep them accountable. Go, do what you need to, come back to class.

Pretty sure female teachers have more bathroom access than the students. They are probably not having to spend time running around trying to find a bathroom that isn’t locked.

No, I think one part of this that’s important to understand is that this has long been the accepted norm for teachers.

I have worked at schools with 80 minute class periods, 5 minute passing periods, and the nearest faculty restroom two floors down, with an inevitable line. So, the bell rings and you have 5 minutes to talk the kids who line up at your desk to ask questions, touch base with another teacher, walk down the hallway, past behavior like blocking the boys bathroom that is so egregious you have to stop and address it, get in line for a stall, realize there is time for one more person to go if you’re going to make it back for the end of the passing period, offer your spot to the 8 month pregnant colleague behind you and hold it until you can try again.

Now, is that the way it should be? No, of course not.

And does the fact that that is how it often works means the kids should be treated the same way? No, of course not.

But it does mean that a segment of the teacher population is thinking “we’re preparing them for the real world”, because in their experience that is what the real world is like.

It also means that when people suggest solutions like “teachers should monitor the bathrooms during passing periods” they get push back.

I mean I've been "living in the real world" since I graduated high school 20 years ago and the only time I have not had reliable access to a bathroom was.....in high school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t believe some of you are in favor of this. Bathrooms were inaccessible like this when I was in high school and I coped by not drinking any water at all during the day. I had constant anxiety about needing to use the bathroom and not being able to, and also a lot of headaches and digestive issues from being dehydrated.

That’s dramatic. No one in high school in the 90s early 2000s was carrying around a water bottle drinking water all day. We were all fine. No one was have digestive problems and headaches from not carrying around their Stanley all day.

It isn’t that I’m in favor or limiting the bathroom, but I just don’t see it as that big of a deal. You get 20-30 min lunch plus 5 min in between classes. Figure out when to fit in bathroom breaks if you need to. Most heathy teens don’t need to use the bathroom very often. Most teachers grant exceptions too. If this is a problem for your particular student then talk to principal or teachers. But it actually is a reasonable expectation for most students to contain bathroom trips to lunch and passing time- and most kids are fine with this

At that time most people were bringing disposable water bottles. Are you really saying it’s totally normal for a teenager to drink nothing all day until they return home from school and this unhealthy or fine? It was hard to go to the bathroom during the five minutes between classes because they would look the bathrooms, or only lock some but you never knew which would be open.
You all would riot if an office did this to you but it’s ok for teenagers?

Yes. Teens can survive until 2:30 having “only” eaten and drank at breakfast and lunch. It isn’t some special ops mission to be able to mange going to the bathroom at lunch hour or passing if you need to. As you can see from the teachers chiming in, it’s a complicated problem that is beyond just couple kids, and isn’t limited to only vandalism. Schools try to limit access to passing and lunch and parents complain, schools try to discipline kids vandalising, parents deny and complain, schools try to limit kids who are seeming to ask for too many passes and are gone too long, parents complain. Schools can’t win.

Serious question, do you only drink liquids at breakfast, lunch, and dinner? I am an adult and I normally drink coffee at breakfast and sip water throughout the day. I normally need to use the bathroom at least twice before lunch, once right when I arrive at the office. Imagine what you would do if an employer told you you could not access a bathroom until lunch time.

No, I don’t continuously sip water throughout the day. I definitely didn’t in high school or elementary school. No one carried water bottles or used the fountains regularly. Besides, it’s not even all day. School gets out at 2:30 or earlier. They are eating and drinking at breakfast and lunch. No one is getting clinically dehydrated in those hours.

It is absolutely crazy town to even begin to contemplate fluid restriction. Adding it to my list of reasons why I homeschool. This is literally abuse and nobody can tell me differently.

Not to mention, people have to poop (sometimes more than once a day!) and girls have menstrual cycles. This is abusive and unhygienic and sex-based discrimination.

Right?? Again I cannot believe some people are condoning this. Human beings need to eat and drink and relieve themselves. High schoolers too!

Female teachers also deal with limited time for bathroom trips when dealing with their period.

My son's school sent kids to the washroom in pairs (planned, one responsible student with one who may struggle) for a while to keep them accountable. Go, do what you need to, come back to class.

Pretty sure female teachers have more bathroom access than the students. They are probably not having to spend time running around trying to find a bathroom that isn’t locked.

No, I think one part of this that’s important to understand is that this has long been the accepted norm for teachers.

I have worked at schools with 80 minute class periods, 5 minute passing periods, and the nearest faculty restroom two floors down, with an inevitable line. So, the bell rings and you have 5 minutes to talk the kids who line up at your desk to ask questions, touch base with another teacher, walk down the hallway, past behavior like blocking the boys bathroom that is so egregious you have to stop and address it, get in line for a stall, realize there is time for one more person to go if you’re going to make it back for the end of the passing period, offer your spot to the 8 month pregnant colleague behind you and hold it until you can try again.

Now, is that the way it should be? No, of course not.

And does the fact that that is how it often works means the kids should be treated the same way? No, of course not.

But it does mean that a segment of the teacher population is thinking “we’re preparing them for the real world”, because in their experience that is what the real world is like.

It also means that when people suggest solutions like “teachers should monitor the bathrooms during passing periods” they get push back.