Students returned to campus from winter break, to see 14 new all-gender bathrooms to the Forest Grove campus, 30 across all campuses.
Discussions regarding adding all-gender bathrooms started during fall term of 2015. The Undergraduate and Graduate Student Senates, Vice President of University Advancement Cassie Warman and the Center for Gender Equity, CGE, worked together to bring these all inclusive spaces onto campus due to the indication from students that this was a topic to address.
“Students had mentioned [the need for allgender bathrooms] at Student Senate meetings and other things that said this is something our school needs,” said junior and Vice President of Campus Betterment Benjamin Becerra. “This is something that students have identified that would make them feel comfortable and safe at school and then we were met with a lot of support with the administration.”
There is currently a list of locations for the new all-gender bathrooms, but the university will be releasing a map soon to help students be able to easily find and access the new inclusive spaces.
One of the goals for the Undergraduate Student Senate this year was to work on inclusivity.
“One of the things that we did after the end of last year and in the beginning of this year was coming up with goals and one of our goals was inclusivity and this is a huge deal for inclusivity so everyone can feel comfortable,” said sophomore and President of Undergraduate Student Senate Elona Wilson. “So this is awesome and I am so excited to see where Pacific takes gender inclusivity.”
To officially welcome these all-gender restrooms on to campus, CGE, President Lesley Hallick, the Pacific University Cabinet and the Undergraduate Student Senate will participate in a ribbon cutting in the University Center at the noon hour on Tuesday, Feb. 16. CGE Director Martha Rampton said students, faculty and staff are welcome to attend.
“Students, we are the consumers on campus and we have so much more power than we know,” said Becerra. “When we really rally behind something, the administration can’t ignore that and a lot of the times they don’t necessarily want to but it just hasn’t been brought to their attention. When things are brought to their attention, good things happen.”
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