College denies keeping track of students’ menstrual cycles to put stop to exercise excuses

The school claims that an industrious student came up with the idea of a ‘time of the month’ registry on her own

A university in Shanxi province has stepped forward to deny that it attempted to keep track of its students’ menstrual cycles.

Reports hit Chinese social media earlier this week that female students at the Taiyuan University of Science and Technology had been asked to record the dates of their time of the month after too many students had been using “cramps” as an excuse for getting out of mandatory morning jogs.

One female student was reportedly assigned to keep track of her peers’ cycles and reject any excuses that did not line up with the timetable — with each student allowed a maximum of 10 days off per month because of their period.

The university instituted its mandatory morning exercise policy last week with all students required to jog four laps around the school’s track each day at 6:30 am.

On Monday, the university told The Paper that, in fact, the student in charge of the daily runs had come up with idea of a menstrual cycle register on her own, with no orders from school officials. While admitting that the student’s method was a bit a extreme, the school applauded the industrious menstrual monitor for her good intentions of getting more students to regularly exercise.

The university also added that many of its students were strongly in favor of the mandatory morning jogs, something that netizens found even less believable than the school knowing nothing about the menstrual registry.