Students Complain about Bathrooms at South Kingstown High School
By Liz Maciocio
When sophomore Ava Wentworth goes to the South Kingstown High School girls bathrooms, she avoids touching the door by pushing it open with her foot.
As she walks in, the first thing noticed is the grime in between bathroom tiles. “There is dirt on the floor and in the stalls,” Wentworth said as she looked around. “The bathrooms at SKHS are not clean enough for me to touch without washing my hands right after.”
Other SKHS students agree.
“The bathrooms are always disgusting,” said senior Faith Hutchins. “They always smell bad and they’re gross.”
Another student Emma Maciocio, a senior at South Kingstown High School, said that there have been “planners found in the toilets” and “holes in the sanitary bins” in many of the restrooms.
“Our bathrooms would not pass a health examination,” said South Kingstown High School sophomore Caleb Manning.
Every day students head to the restrooms expecting that necessities, like toilet paper and paper towels, will be provided. Yet, many students say that the school routinely fails to provide these materials.
Dr. Chip McGair, the principal of South Kingstown High School, believes “the custodial staff at SKHS does a fantastic job cleaning the bathrooms and keeping them accessible.”
Manning agrees with McGair. “The custodians are not to blame for the bathrooms at our school,” Manning said, “but the bathrooms are still not sanitary.”
In the second-floor girls’ bathroom at South Kingstown High School, there is a large hole next to the sink — exposing pipes, other discarded parts of the wall, and gum.
“Most students just want to go to the bathroom, do what they have to do, and get back to class,” McGair said, “but there are also the students who don’t respect our bathrooms.”
This lack of respect is shown in the vandalism in SKHS bathrooms. Students often draw on bathroom stalls and walls, expressing foul language and slang.
“The custodians do a great job of cleaning up the restrooms, but our students have trouble respecting the facilities,” McGair said.
In the SKHS first floor girls’ bathroom, inappropriate language can be found written inside bathroom stalls.
McGair believes the restrooms would pass examinations from the health department, but “not at the end of the day” due to the vandalism and destruction created by SKHS students.
McGair said he has seen “photos and videos” of the vandalism to “stay up to date” on what is being written on walls and stalls. The principal added that “the town is thinking very hard about renovations.”
After hearing that the town is considering the bathroom renovations, Manning became ecstatic. “Yes! That is what this school needs. New, clean bathrooms are important to me and every student at this school.”
Certain areas of the school restroom are not taken care of at all and show signs of decay. “Dust and white stuff” settles in a corner of the ladies’ first-floor bathroom, according to Wentworth.
While McGair might think that the restroom facilities that he sees on the daily are clean, most students have a very different opinion. The overall upkeep of the school is commonly discussed between students at the school.
“SKHS reminds me of a prison,” sophomore Callie Pasyanos said. “The bathrooms are the parts of the school that are most overlooked.”
Pasyanos also said that “toilets are always clogged, there is very little soap, and there are never paper towels to dry our hands with — only electric dryers.” These electric hand dryers also have become an issue at the school.
In the 2018–2019 school year at SKHS, honors biology teacher Mr. Jeff Johnson conducted a test in the school bathrooms under the electric hand dryers. A student of Johnson’s, Sadie Rosenblum, participated in this experiment and said that “the Petri dishes that were held under the hand dryers compared to Petri dishes outside of the hand dryers showed growth of about 200 colonies of bacteria.”
The bacteria from these hand dryers can spread throughout SKHS, making more than just the bathrooms unsanitary.
As she exits the restroom, Ava Wentworth kicks the door open once again to avoid germs.
