School Toilets

Bump

Thanks for the help. I guess it’s time I carried on bothering the school. They did send me something from the architect, so maybe I could go straight to them and cc the school.

Please see my post above.
Id print of the Gov website info from the Department of Levelling up and ask the school to send to their crap architect.

I would never make such changes to any building out of concern for the welfare of women and girls and now clients can’t ask for it either. I’m guessing this is a male architect. Bet the wc cubicles won’t be wide enough for a sanitary bin either. I dispare !

Signed.
As an aside
All new buildings have to make provision for single sex toilets.
School etc should not, now, be redesigned to omit already existing single sex toilets.
See attached doc from Govn website.

As an architect I’m disgusted that a PP noted an architect working on a redesign for her dc school said ‘ there’s no time to redesign?! , That’s a shocking response from clearly a very lazy excuse for a member of my profession. Clearly a crap architect then.

Signed

Not sure if it’s much use but have you contacted the health and safety executive to seek advice? They may not be any use but without calling you may never know. My DS is epileptic so doors that go all the way up are an issue. Fortunately the college he now attends has both single sex facilities and gender neutral ones which are actually rooms off a corridor and not cubicles. I was nicely surprised - it’s a new build so someone somewhere has obviously thought about toilet provision.

Obviously you know they are fobbing you off. I got fed up seeing a venue that just installed new toilets mixed sexed toilets at great cost. I phoned up the manufacturers and they admitted they had never been asked what happens when someone collapses in a full ceiling to floor height cubicle. The door only swings inwards. There is a method to open them but it involves a special tool and two people to lift the door as it’s heavy. There’s a YouTube video apparently. The venue wouldn’t have a clue.

BlooDeBloop · Yesterday 11:02

..problems were rare and the open nature of the room meant it had a positive impact on behaviour management.

Some people think that caning has a positive effect on behaviour in schools, but that's also illegal.

My daughter’s school is about to update to the single-sex cubicle and shared hand-basin toilets. I’ve written multiple emails and asked to see a risk assessment. Got fobbed off because the contract has been paid for They did email the architect to ask, but they just said that it’s fine and there is t room to change the design.

it’s going to cost a fortune and take a long time to fix it when this fad for mis-interpreting the guidance is over. They can’t say they weren’t warned.

I have spoken to someone in teaching about it. There are real issues for teachers when monitoring toilets. They can’t go into the toilets alone, otherwise they’re open to all sorts of accusations etc. it’s very difficult for schools to deal with. I don’t think making the toilets unusable is the right answer though.

I've posted on the Petitions board, along with the guidance for school toilets. Schools are supposed to provide single sex toilets for children over the age of 8.
https://www.sec-ed.co.uk/best-practice/school-toilets-guidance-and-regulations/

The sad thing is, this is something very easily to resolve. Single sex and mixed toilets, the distribution of which can be aligned to usage.
I have been involved in 3 school who have u turned following making unconsulted changes. They all ended up having just 1 unisex loo as pretty much all the pupils chose to use the single sex ones!

They get around the period/privacy issue by having single sex cubicles elsewhere on the premises. In fact there is a girl's by the welfare section which I think is a good idea for potential support from women staff working there. My son is holding on and that was part of the reason for contacting the school. He is dehydrated, gets home, drinks loads, keeps him awake at night so we have sleeping issues in part because of the ms provision. The man was sympathetic but basically argued there is SS provision but not in the main area of the school. So I'm 🤷‍♂️ what more can I do? Yes there do appear to be problems with security in cubicles but the school's opinion is the other aspects of safety like hiding in the toilets to avoid class occur daily so they take an on balance approach.

You could ask safeguarding if they have done risk assessments for pupils who have conditions where they may collapse behind the door (epilepsy affects 1 in 100, diabetes, passing out, concussion, strokes). My Dd was very healthy then collapsed unattended that led to brain damage. In her educational plan it was then stated she had to go to the girls loos not the disabled so she was visible from the door gap and they could get to her if she collapsed.

Risk assessments that also need to be done in schools with full height doors and mix sex toilets are whether it increases the risk of risky behaviour like drug taking, self harming and sexual assault? Spoiler alert: very likely to as at least one child gets raped inside a school premises every school day (parliamentary report 2016) and there are studies that show mixed sex toilets lead to more assaults. Obviously this report was pre the fashion in mix sex toilets so ask him if he thinks small private cubicles will make the problem better or worse.

Another risk assessment is in the event of an evacuation (bomb alert, fire, intruder), how to they do a ‘sweep’ of the toilets when a door is locked? As an ex-teacher I have done the checks on girls and boys cubicle blocks and it was easy- shout and look for feet. If a cubicle is locked you really bend down but it only takes a few secs. Full height doors jam easier anyway, ‘out of order’ signs get ripped off etc. so how would this work?
It should also be assessed at how this would affect attendance for girls on periods, or children that may ‘hold-on’ leading to uti or bowel problems.

I think the safeguarding lead needs to think a bit harder. And ask him to run all the risk assessment by the female staff too.

It's frustrating isn't it. For children aged 8 and over, the toilets need to be floor to ceiling and with washbasin within cubicle to be legal. Many schools are breaking the law and they know it looking at you, DD's sixth form who have ignored all email correspondence pointing this out. Thankfully she's now left.

Signed &shared

Signed

Signed.

Sadly, my school is doubling down on their ms provision. The head of safeguarding initially tried to give me the unisex thing until I politely pointed out the cubicles lack hand basins. Then he justified them by saying any problems were rare and the open nature of the room meant it had a positive impact on behaviour management. I just don't know how to tackle this. They seem wedded to these bloomin toilets.

Signed, thank you

Signed. I was forced to use mixed sex toilets at school, it was horrible.

Signed and shared, I hope all this helps put pressure on the school to do the right thing.

Signed

Signed, DS secondary brought, I challenged and was fobbed off. They've gone back to single sex within a year.

Hope that's a portent of things to come

Signed and shared.

The unisex toilets in schools (and universities) is a crazy idea.

Signed. Well done that girl!