All 44 schools in the Greater Victoria School District have something in common — at least one gender-neutral bathroom.
It’s something the district has been working on for the past few years, said Greater Victoria School Board chairwoman Jordan Watters, adding Greater Victoria is a leader — “I don’t know that other districts have policy that requires gender-neutral bathrooms in every school.”
This past week, Victoria High School had a brief ceremony to mark the designation of another bathroom.
The majority of the gender-neutral bathrooms in the district are single-stall, but Vic High is home to the district’s first multi-stall, gender-neutral facility. It’s a former girls’ bathroom on the second floor. Anyone is welcome to use it.
Grade 12 student Sienna Nargang said it’s a good thing for the school.
“I think that it’s been a lot of work from a lot of different students and I feel really proud to be part of such an accepting community that allows all students to be themselves and feel safe when they go to school.”
James Rodriguez, also in Grade 12, said that as a transgender student, he was worried at first about how the bathroom would be received.
“It was a little bit scary because I didn’t how people would react to it, if there were going to be any problems.”
But it has been “really, really amazing” and the bathroom is being used by everyone, not one particular group, Rodriguez said. “It’s been very welcoming and normal.”
Vice-principal Chris Koutougos said the decision to designate the bathroom came from the school administration “because we feel that it’s about providing safe access for all students in the bathroom and it’s about us moving forward as a school community.”
Adding gender-neutral bathrooms at the elementary, middle and secondary levels has not created any problems, she said.
“In fact, in some instances, anecdotally, I have heard that people spend less time in the bathroom, so it actually minimizes issues.”
Watters said people choose to use them for various reasons. “Maybe it’s the closest bathroom to your classroom, maybe it’s where you feel most comfortable.”
She said the only cost in designating the bathrooms has been signage.
Discussion of gender-neutral bathrooms is a good fit with the district’s Diversity and Inclusion Forum held last week, Watters said.
“It really looked across the full gamut of what inclusion can and should be.”
