Lexington Public Schools Superintendent Julie Hackett shared the Lexington High School project team’s plan to build a mix of all-gender and gender-specific restrooms in the new high school building at a School Committee meeting on March 10.
The plan calls for 60 percent all-gender restrooms and 40 percent gendered restrooms. There would be a mix of all-gender and gendered restrooms on every floor of the high school, with single-use rooms by the locker rooms, and single-use staff and faculty restrooms throughout the new building, Brian Black, an architect with SMMA, the firm on the project, described at the School Committee meeting.
Members of Lexington’s School Building Committee had conflicting opinions on the topic, but it was up to the School Committee to take a final vote on whether to build the bathrooms as planned.
“A student who does not personally wish to use a gender-neutral bathroom is not harmed by its availability, while a student whose needs are not accommodated has no alternative,” Hackett read from a letter she sent to the Massachusetts School Building Authority on the topic during that School Committee meeting. “Framing this as a matter of majority preference risks conflating inclusion with imposition, and I think it is important that we stay clear-eyed about that distinction as we move forward.”
The decision to configure the school’s bathrooms this way was not just made by Hackett. She worked with LHS principal Andrew Baker, facilities personnel, and the LHS building project team to develop the plan.
Many Massachusetts public schools, including Wellesley High School and Waltham High, have gender-neutral restrooms. Those restrooms are largely single-use, however. The restrooms Lexington imagines building are multi-use. The project team envisions the restrooms looking a little different than the traditional multi-use restroom one might picture in their head.
The restrooms would have full-height stalls with only a few inches open at the bottom of each door so staff and faculty can see in for safety reasons. They’ll also have airport-like entrances and exits — that means no doors.
“An adult would want to be able to hear what is happening inside that space if there’s a ruckus going on so that someone can respond to that immediately and go in and take care of the situation,” Black said.
Many people who spoke up about the recommended bathroom configuration at the School Committee meeting were in favor of the plan, arguing it could bring more safety to students who aren’t cisgender.
“I lose a lot of class time to kids just trying to get their bathroom needs met…I can tell you there is definitely a need,” Rachel Jayson, who’s been teaching music at LHS for 17 years, said. “I am in full support of the plan…I think it’s really thoughtful and actually speaks to what our students need.”
“There are a lot of all-gender bathrooms at UVM and I just wanted to speak on how nice it is to have those bathrooms,” Callen Lin-Butler, a recent Lexington High School graduate and current student at the University of Vermont said. “It’s often seen as a scarier thing to have than it is, it’s very normal at school and doesn’t cause any problems, it just makes going to the bathroom easier for a lot of people.”
“I congratulate you on integrating gender-neutral bathrooms in the new high school,” Lexington resident Olga Guttag said. She went on to raise concerns about all-gender bathrooms leading to sexual harassment claims.
“Is it going to be possible to change the ratio once the building is built if we’re deciding there are some problems?” she asked.
At a different point in the meeting, Hackett noted the restrooms could be converted in that way if needed, but that is not something they plan to do.
Lexington resident Abhi Bapat said he is worried about female students being bullied in the gender-neutral bathrooms, whether feminine hygiene products will be available in them, and how clean they’ll be kept.
“I do have some concerns about potentially bullying of girls in the all-gender bathrooms…what I’m talking about is a young girl being bullied or at risk of being bullied in an all-gender bathroom,” he said.
The LHS building project team’s plan to implement majority all-gender multi-use restrooms was criticized by the prominent right-wing X account, Libs of TikTok.
“This plan specifically pushes to create ‘affinity spaces’ for LGBTQ students and staff,” the account wrote. “They want to use your tax dollars to push this woke nonsense.”
The post garnered over 100,000 views and 3,100 likes in two days.
School Committee member Larry Freeman shared how he was bullied for being gay in public restrooms growing up. He argued the implementation of all-gender bathrooms wouldn’t create opportunities for bullying, but it would mitigate bullying that already happens.
“I find it interesting that whenever we talk about bathrooms and LGBTQ people, that’s when it seems like general society starts having all these questions about safety,” he said. “As a gay person I can tell you I was the one that was not safe in high school. Going to the bathroom was not safe. Of course, I had no choice, I had to go, but it wasn’t safe, I was bullied.”
In the end, four School Committee members voted in favor of the recommended bathroom configuration and one abstained — Eileen Jay, who is an abutter of the high school, so she cannot vote on high school related agenda items. The vote is therefore considered unanimous.
I’m glad to see this. As Larry Freeman observes, plenty of kids get bullied in the closed-door bathrooms by their same-gender peers. I strongly suspect that open-door bathrooms will reduce the amount of bullying, vaping, and other shenanigans that take place in LHS bathrooms.
Though I question the methodology by which the 60-40% bathroom type allocation was made, I am excited that a great deal of design thought has gone into what seems to be like an insignificant, yet socially very important, component of the building. I am very happy that once the school becomes occupied, if the 60-40 ratio becomes impractical, a change can be made by only changing the signage, not by additional construction.
LHS clearly needs gender-neutral bathrooms. They will serve more than just the LGBTQ community. Fathers will be able to accompany young girls, disabled persons will be able to be accompanied by a different gender caregiver, etc. The design also makes supervision of all bathrooms much easier than in the current school.
Having a mix of gendered and gender-neutral bathrooms is a necessity, and making the adjustment in the mix of each as easy as changing the signage is prudent use of our taxpayer dollars. Thank you to the architects for this fine design.