The Journey to Find a Bathroom

By: Noa Rodgers '27

Finding an unlocked bathroom during class has proven to be extremely difficult. No matter what classroom you are in, there’s a good chance that you will need to walk for five minutes just to find an open bathroom. When you get back to class, you’ve been gone for fifteen minutes and have missed a majority of the lesson. This has become a huge issue at SOCES, but what or who is causing this? In all honesty, many people have contributed to the closing of our bathrooms. It has become an endless cycle of bathrooms being closed and students being out of class for long periods of time.

9th grader Maribelle Boktor says, “After school, I have to go to the bathroom before an extracurricular and it literally takes fifteen minutes because the line is so long and there’s only one bathroom open. Half of the stalls are messy and trashed.” Dirty bathrooms are also a major issue. Many students leave trash on the ground and soap on the sink. This behavior overwhelms the custodians, and with the addition of the new buildings and the bathrooms that come with them, lack of custodial staff may also be an issue.

Teacher Ms. Nelson says, “We need people in charge to provide more hours for the custodial staff to actually be able to clean the bathrooms. Kids are leaving class frequently because of lack of access. I think this is a significant problem.” Clearly, both students and teachers are not happy about these issues. Many students want to be in class and learn, but it becomes difficult to do so when bathrooms all over the school are closed.