To think secondary schools should not have unisex toilets?

[seriouslylong]

So my daughter started secondary school this year in a temporary sight and yesterday moved to the permanent sight. She came home and told me they only have unisex toilets in the school

I looked on a local Facebook page this morning and there was a parent on there asking for opinions.

I don't think boys and girls should have to share a toilet! They need their privacy at this age!

What are your thoughts? Also would be interested to hear if your children have unisex toilets at school?

You would wipe any blood off with loo roll before you pulled up your pants and opened the lock/door handle

Lmfao at the idea blood comes off your hands with a bit of toilet paper.

Slight derail but I am disgusted that girls have to go to the toilet to avoid being pestered at school. Vile. Thank GOD my DD is at an all girls. And as for wanking off in a toilet at school WTF?

Hate all this gender neutral toilet crap (no pun intended).

Thank GOD my DD is at an all girls.

Perhaps because of my age, but the worse bullying I experienced was at an all girls comp. In fact, I must have used the dark, damp toilets there about three times in my whole five years. Urgh.

And as for wanking off in a toilet at school WTF?

Not just in the toilets either.

The argument for non-segregated toilets is primarily that they reduce bullying. In my experience, in a range of schools, they feel far safer

Dd is 4ft 7. She would not feel safer in a toilet with 6 ft 5 yr 12 boys. God knows the kids in her class are well over 5 ft

I do not like unisex toilets at all - luckily they are few and far between in most circumstances - but for example on a plane I really dislike using them just after a man has emerged (horrible past experiences - plural) and yes, I know, NAMALT, but quite a few seem to have aiming/bowl cleaning difficulties and leave them in a disgusting state.
I can't imagine teenage boys would be any better. And yes again, I know women and girls can leave them in a bad state too but IME men are worse.
This is in addition to points about privacy and dignity that PPs have raised which are also most important. In fact I thought schools had to provide at least some single sex facilities under various regulations.
Incidentally I've had reason to use girls' toilets in two mixed secondary schools recently and one was good, clean but utilitarian while the other was spotless and more like a toilet in a nice, modern workplace or public area of a good hotel. Neither had completely enclosed cubicles. I shudder to think what using them would be like if they were not single-sex.

I would have hated this so much as a teenager. I felt embarrassed enough in a girls toilet having to change sanitary towels, I would have been mortified if boys were there too! Sanitary products are LOUD and many teenage boys are idiots. Not a good combination. YANBU, teenagers should definitely be separated.

YANBU. If schools provide mixed sex toilets they are supposed to be enclosed cubicles, not cubicles in a room with shared sinks. Its the law.

www.sec-ed.co.uk/best-practice/school-toilets-guidance-and-regulations/

Current DfE regs, worth a read particularly the bit that says some schools are interpreting them wrongly.
womansplaceuk.org/mixed-sex-toilets-ins-chools/

Jeez
Unisex toilets at home....
Never get blood on your hands that loo paper won't wipe off

My poop don't smell and it comes out in pretty colours as well

There are a couple of blocks of unisex toilets at my DDs’ school.

They do meet the planning regs of being fully enclosed (with proper walls) and with their own individual sinks. The corridor is between is open.

TBF they’re actually far more private than the old toilets we all grew up with that had one room with basically 4ft of vertical cardboard between each cubicle. Kids can be horrible to their own sex over natural bodily just as much as they can to the opposing sex.

I certainly wouldn’t be protesting if blocks were segregated into boys and girls tho.

Having previously worked in the hospitality industry I can confirm

Men and Women are just as bad as each other in their care of public toilets. Be it in the day (sober) or in the evening.

So many disgusting sites.

Men shitting in urinals for a laugh
Women smearing the walls
Men putting their shitty boxers in the cistern
Women just shitting on the floor or sink.
Men pissing in the bin
Women hovering on the toilet getting 1% in the bowl.

The only issue I see with this is. If your crush enters the toilet at the same time.

You’d just have to hold it in if you needed a poo.

Can’t be having them hear/smell your number 2 activities..... save that for marriage... Them on the toilet, you having a relaxing bath....

Is my blood weird? If I wipe it with a dry tissue I just end up with tissue stuck to the blood.

The only way I'd be able to get blood off my hands without a sink in there would be to put my hands in the flow of the flushing toilet and rub hard, not exactly pleasant!

Our secondary school has all unisex toilets - in reality, boys and girls use different sets and they have naturally become male/ female.

I really don't see the issue with shared sink areas. If the cubicles are floor to ceiling, what's the issue?

I would never ever wash bloody knickers in a public toilet sink. Or get changed except in the cubicle and cant believe people would.

This definitely factored into my decision to send my dd to an all girls school. She's autistic and stresses out about public toilets at the best of times, there's no way on earth she would use unisex toilets. I am against them. Women need their own space and I am so angry we are having to defend it. In other parts of the world they are campaigning for women's spaces, here we just airily give them away like they're nothing

do these unisex toilets i assume not have urinals?

I can't see the need for uni-sex toilets anywhere, make your mind up and choose one!

Even if unisex loos are fully enclosed, crimes of voyeurism rise. People can hide recording devices, phone cameras etc.

An absolute no from me.

You might get the odd teenage boy who abuses the situation, for starters.

If I was a teenage girl I would want to feel completely safe from male attention when going to the toilet.

Even as an adult woman I wouldn't want to share shared cubicle toilets with men.

FFS - and I never say that phrase - who thinks up this bonkers stuff. Absolute idiots. Probably PC idiots at that.

I told DH about this, he was appalled and said that he would have hated this, in fact still would hate it, unless it's a fully enclosed with sink set-up.

I am a man and found smelly school toilets something to avoid unless I really could not wait until I got home. I was not in fear of someone a lot taller or bigger than me, not a teenage girl with periods, nor having unwanted attention. There were no people in my school from traditions or cultures where men and women would never share certain facilities.

The point about some men and women being disgusting in their use of toilets does not require a solution of mixed toilets.

OP is not being unreasonable at all to expect single sex toilets.

OP they sound fine to me. They’re open with full doors ...

More to the point the toilets are unisex so your daughter needs to get used to this.

Ok...I've actually worked in several schools with open plan toilets. People who are worried about the noise have clearly never been in a secondary school. These toilets open out onto a corridor or onto a social area. They have walls and doors that are ceiling to floor and thick doors. No one is hearing a tinkle... especially when a few hundred children are on their break.
Our cubicles are sexed...so if there is an area with 50 cubicles then they would have 25 female and 25 male. Centralised washing areas...

Unisex toilets reduce physical and emotional bullying. There is far less vandalism also.

They have them in DDs school and apparently work well except the locks do need changing due to the ability to open from the outside and less toilets so longer waiting times. I asked my DD and the girls tend to wait for a girl to leave and use the same one as there has been teasing (hopefully that’s all) of what has been left on the toilet seat when a girls uses the toilet vacated by a boy especially year 10 and 11. DD does now have a packet of wipes in her bag.