AIBU to think this toilet design is madness in a secondary school!

[Tailtwister]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-22891134

Male/female open plan toilets in a secondary school! AIBU to think this is a crazy design? I could be wrong, but it looks like a recipe for disaster to me.

[GrendelsMum]

I work in a new building which also incorporates public spaces, and all the loos are available for everyone to use, including people with disabilities / baby changing.

It feels very equitable, and means that everyone has to join the same queue.

[cantspel]

Then wipe them with loo roll whilst in the cubicle before you come out and wash them at the sink. Do people leave a single sex loo dripping blood just because only anotherwoman can see so it doesn't matter?

[phlebas]

or take a packet of wipes in with you?

[Justfornowitwilldo]

This was after wiping with loo roll. They weren't 'dripping in blood'. They were covered with what is left on skin if you wipe away blood with tissue. I didn't use tampons as an 11, 12 or 13 year old, so this was every time I needed a wee.

If a school has the kind of problems that make this a viable solution I don't think I'd want to use it.

[mimiasovitch]

My dd is in a new build school with these. When designing the new part of the school they took some older pupils to Norway (I think) to look at features of their schools, and the toilets were something the students wanted themselves. They do still have traditional loos for those who prefer them.

[HomeHelpMeGawd]

I think this design is an excellent solution to the problems of bullying that have persisted for years in school loos. By having the washing area open at both ends, there's nowhere for bullies to hide.

I do wish they hadn't reinforced the tired old notion of girls = pink, boys = blue, however.

[phlebas]

or a school with no particular issues but swanky new loos!

[McPie]

Guessed before I clicked that this would be about the Lasswade Centre! The old toilets were horrible and were mainly used for smoking or skiving so the new ones are a massive improvement. The closest swiming pool has unisex changing so I honestly cant see the issue.
My oldest ds starts there in August (it is literally a stones throw from my house) and hes not bothered about it.

[Reastie]

dingit I get those dreams too! What do you think it says about us

[Justfornowitwilldo]

I doubt he would be!

[mrsjuneyjuney]

I think it is a good idea to stop bullying and pupils hiding during lessons.

I don't know how but I managed to not go into the toilets EVER whilst I was at secondary school. I don't think I drank much liquid and had a steel bladder.

They were down a corridor and people used to smoke and fight in there it was very intimidating. It was obvious people smoked in there but no one ever did anything.

In fact sometimes I do have dreams about those toilets!!

[valiumredhead]

Good idea imo as long as the walls go floor to ceiling.

Lots of public places/restaurants have loos like this now.

[valiumredhead]

Mrs, you are like Shitbreak in the film American Pie

[noblegiraffe]

My school has toilets that open out onto a corridor, but the cubicles are proper rooms with full doors, individual sinks and driers. There is CCTV pointing at the doors so bullying can't go on through the doors.

[Pendeen]

quoteunquote

That reference is only applicable to England & Wales, not Scotland.

[Justfornowitwilldo]

The sinks and dryers inside cubicles sound perfect.

[MackerelOfFact]

I remember being mortified at the thought of other girls (most of who were just congregated in a gang outside applying make-up, not even using the loos) hearing the sanitary towel rustle through the gaps above and below the doors, so it's hardly as though single-sex toilets eliminate this! If there are solid doors and the cubicles are completely sealed I don't see the problem. Plus it will become a much less attractive meeting place so the amount of people loitering around and not using the sinks/dryers will be less.

I can see that sometimes girls do need privacy to clean up hands/clothes after period incidents, but there may well be sinks in some of the cubicles too, especially if they are accessible ones.

[mrsjuneyjuney]

yes I am like shitbreak but unlike him I didn't go home at lunchtime, me and my bladder of steel just hardcored it up and waited til I got home!

[SirChenjin]

I'm really struggling to understand why anyone thinks these open plan toilets will stop kids congregating or bullying. If you've been inside a High School recently (or remember them from your own time) you'll know that kids congregate anywhere and everywhere. Unless teachers are around, they will congregate and they will bully. An open plan toilet won't stop that - if anything, it will increase, with girls and boys showing off in front of each other.

[HollyBerryBush]

We have those toilets - slightly different design - there is a central wall with the cubicles backing onto them, so boys and girls do not come out of the door and face each other, but the open-plan-ness is the same - complete with what I euphemistically refer to as the fondue fountain at each end, hot air dryers.

Each cubicle has a smoke alarm; the sinks no longer get stuffed with paper towels and taps left to run or little fires started. the incidence of bullying has dropped dramatically, no one can skulk off for a quick fag 9well they do they just have new hidey holes). The complex is opposite the main office so they are observed going in and out all the time - no truanting lessons, no two to a cubicle and so forth.

Its far far safer for all concerned. The down side is the hot air dryers - we now have a full time cleaner mopping up hand shake drips or the floor would be incidentally awash. But again her presence prevents truanting, bullying, poor behaviour and so forth.

Oh it doesn't stop the boys squeezing their spots in front of the girls or the girls whipping out the mascara at 3pm though - they are quite unabashed at carrying out their ablutions in front of each other despite the office ladies blowing up big pictures of the Marx Brothers in an attempt to stop the fad for big black chunky eyebrows!!!

[SirChenjin]

Maybe that's key - have the toilets facing away from each other? Sounds far more sensible, and gives an illusion of privacy? Love the Marx Brothers pictures

[SirChenjin]

DD(14) just wandered in and I showed her the photo of the toilets and asked her what she thought. Utter horror, was the reaction. I asked her why, and she said that she would be mortified if she had her period, she would hate to have to use the toilets in front of the boys, and she said the boys would think it funny to use the girls side. It's wrong wrong wrong, apparently.

She has 2 brothers btw, and we are very open with nudity etc - she's not easily fazed.

[Floggingmolly]

Needing armed police because the teachers had lost control of the school sounds like something from a Stephen King novel, birdsgottafly
How can you attribute this to the design of the toilets?

[HollyBerryBush]

I was mortified at our Academy Chain partner - they put a set of open plan toilets in the school foyer in a sort of horn shaped semi circle , quite large, one fondue fountain in the middle with what I can only describe as a wall of perspex sheet to give the illusion of a different room - that one piped in music to stop the noise of flushing and unwrapping and dare I say noisy ablutions!

Utterly the wrong place to install the loos however it is a particularly bad school behaviour wise, and it got to the point a pupil had to get, sign for the toilet key from the Head herself . This would account for why it went into special measures if the Head was acting as the toilet attendant!!