By Layla Zedd and Shelisa Sergio
On January 9, 2025, 8:43 AM, an email was sent about adjusted bathroom schedules. All students received this email after the schedules were already in effect. Most students had strong emotions regarding the situation considering how this will be affecting their experience at school. The bathroom schedule was then proven to be inconvenient and inaccessible.
Going around, students were interviewed and asked the same question, “Percentage-wise, how much do you think bathrooms are open?” Each student answered with their full opinion, the average was a low score of 10% and 25%. The highest percentage given was 40% which was given by a current band member. They explained that it was only high because they could use the bathroom in the Performing Arts Center, a building detached from the school. There are 2 upstairs and 2 downstairs, one for each gender, and are only accessible to the students who are enrolled in Band, Theater, and Choir. It is claimed to be tidier than the ones on the main campus but is not provided to all students.
With certain bathrooms being closed when they are supposed to be open, it causes inconvenience for both the students and teachers no matter the time and place of the classroom. Now with the unclear scheduling, students will spend more time than needed to search for a bathroom, let alone use it.
Mr. Penalosa, an Ethnic Studies teacher said, “Students are now taking longer because some of the bathrooms that are typically closer are not open at every hour, so students have to walk further and come back later, and then it disrupts class time.”
This is an example of how it affects everyone schoolwide, not just the students. Although the bathroom schedules are meant to help maintain cleanliness, this has caused more of a problem rather than a solution. The inconvenience of the bathrooms is evident when students have to walk around campus to see which ones are available. Although there are bathrooms in each wing of the school.
“The bathrooms have affected me personally whereas I sometimes have had to travel in circles around the school just so then I could find an open bathroom,” Sophomore Angela Ramos said.
While this poses challenges for students, the intent of it has a purpose. The bathroom schedules allow janitors to keep the bathrooms cleaner, restock frequently, and are helpful for staff, preventing students from staying in the bathrooms for too long.
“There might be benefits for the staff and school for the way they’re trying to keep track of students going in and out of classes. Or they might benefit from keeping less people vaping in the bathrooms,” Angela Ramos said.
However, this discourages people from using bathrooms during school hours because of the quick 7-minute passing period.
“The bathroom schedule is hard for me to follow,” Jeremy Mendoza said.
For some students, this may be a minor inconvenience or may not affect them at all, but for those who have disabilities, it may be more than an inconvenience. Students with disabilities face a bigger problem because they are not always able to use the bathroom closest to them which affects them.
This is the first time a bathroom schedule has been implemented, but do the pros outweigh the cons? The emailed schedule only mentioned half of the bathrooms at school, leaving some confused about other bathroom schedules.
Mr. Penalosa asks, “Is the issue, the fact that the bathrooms are closed at different times, or do we have a more systemic problem because our staff–we’re understaffed–where we don’t have enough folks able to clean all the bathrooms at all the times?
