The staff in charge of cleaning the building have to move lots of trash from every room every single day. That’s a lot of work for just a small group of people.
But most of the trash comes from the bathrooms, even though there are far fewer bathrooms than classrooms. There is still a lot of trash coming from these rooms. Why does this keep happening? Why are the bathrooms trashed every day?
Since the school year started, many teachers reported a high increase in the trash found in the bathrooms’ trash cans, on the floors, and even in the toilets/urinals. Most of this trash is found in the boy’s bathroom, and the cafeteria’s bathrooms are the most trashed in the building. If we take into consideration that students have two times to eat during the day, this means that most students spend half an hour a day at the cafeteria. Considering that they use the bathroom during this time, it would make sense why the bathrooms in the cafeteria are trashed.
But what about the other bathrooms? Well, most of them are trashed too. Because there are four bathrooms on the second floor of the high school, this means that the students in all the classrooms of the second floor have to use these bathrooms, and this might be another reason why the bathrooms are trashed.
In a recent survey I asked students of all grades (via google forms) to rate their use of the bathroom from 1 to 5 so we can see which grade spends more time on the restrooms. This survey isn’t 100% precise, so the results may vary depending on who completed the survey, their gender, any medical conditions, and if their responses are being honest.
According to the survey the freshman spend more time in the bathroom than any other grade. Once again, this is not 100% precise and the results may vary depending on a lot of factors that I already mentioned.
Almost all teachers limit the number of students leaving the classroom to one at a time. By signing the classroom sheet, they can manage and see at what time a student leaves the room and at what time that student returns. By doing this the number of students wandering around the hallways is reduced significatively.
Also teachers are encouraging students to NOT leave trash on the floor, urinals or even in the sinks. Mr. Wandyes had put a poster on the boy’s bathroom located in front of Mr. Marcucci’s room to let students know that they must keep their restrooms clean. Five weeks later the poster disappeared and that specific bathroom had trash over the floor.
This problem will persist until someone takes the time to do anything about it. A recommendation is that bathrooms should be monitored and assistants could take note of who entered the bathroom and their ID, often checking that the bathrooms are being used properly and that there are not any students skipping class or making a mess in them.
This problem might be solved by letting students know that they shouldn’t use more paper towels than they need. A simple act like this could change the use of the bathroom, making them cleaner. Only if students apply these recommendations can we accomplish this goal of maintaining the bathrooms clean for everyone.
