Single-stall restrooms on campus to be relabeled as gender-neutral

Student groups’ push for the designation of more gender-neutral bathrooms in campus buildings has resulted in a University initiative to relabel many single-stall restrooms.

Duke Student Government and Blue Devils United are working with administrators in Facilities Management, the Office for Institutional Equity, the Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity and the Disability Management System to designate a single-occupancy gender-neutral bathroom in every University building with existing single-stall restrooms. Senior Ilana Weisman, executive vice president of DSG, said that the goal of the project is to make campus a welcoming environment for all students.

“We are in a state that is very clearly not supportive of diverse gender identities,” Weisman said. “I think [gender-neutral bathrooms] make a strong difference especially when combined with gender-neutral housing… It sounds non-essential but it’s so inherent to completing the Duke experience, to feel welcome and wanted on campus and to feel like you can be a member of the Duke community.”

Nicholas Antonicci, director of the CSGD, said that restrooms on Duke’s campus which accommodate one person at a time and can be locked should not be gendered.

“The bathrooms that are being converted have the same equipment—a toilet, a sink and a lock. There’s nothing that’s inherently different about them aside from the sign on their door,” he said. “The more we can lessen gendered spaces on campus, the more we can create inclusion for transgender and gender non-conforming people.”

Antonicci explained that not having gender-neutral facilities in a building may cause anxiety for some students about where they can go to the bathroom and may force them to travel to another building.

“They could end up being late to class. Having gender-neutral bathrooms in buildings goes a long way in terms of supporting somebody being on campus for educational reasons and allowing them to succeed and strive,” he added.

Weisman explained that last year she realized Duke had few gender-neutral bathrooms on campus and that she initially advocated for the designation of gender-neutral facilities in the new Student Health and Wellness Center. However, her focus then shifted towards changing the signage on every other single-stall restroom on campus, she said.

DSG’s committee on equity and outreach, along with members of BDU’s policy and advocacy branch, led building walkthroughs in Fall 2015 to identify every single-stall bathroom on campus and in the professional schools, wrote BDU president Steven Soto, a senior.

They created a comprehensive list of existing single-stall bathrooms along with their current designations and signage. Some of these facilities were exclusively designated male or female but most of the bathrooms they identified were technically already gender-neutral, with either the insignia of both the man stick figure and the woman stick figure or with a “unisex” label, Weisman explained.

She noted that the project will replace the existing signage on certain bathrooms with the new label. This gender-neutral signage—developed in partnership with student groups and administrative offices—features only an image of toilet, with the wheelchair symbol also included for those facilities that are handicap-accessible.

“We didn’t want to use any images of people because those can reinforce traditional gender norms which is counterintuitive to what we want to do,” Weisman said. “The Facilities Management office was looking into what other universities had. The thinking was that [this option] was the most universal, most accessible version that also fell in line with what our peer institutions would do.”

Although Weisman said the student groups only had “loose commitment” from administrators in the Fall in their efforts to relabel bathrooms, the project picked up speed in this year.

“I definitely think House Bill 2 happening upped the priority level for the University,” she said.

The passage of HB2 in North Carolina in March revoked a Charlotte ordinance, thereby restricting bathroom use to a person’s “biological sex,” and banned local governments from creating their own anti-discrimination policies. Weisman added that HB2 gave the students “strong leverage” with the University’s offices because she pointed out that Duke had the opportunity to take a stand on the issue.

Soto noted, however, that the student groups’ efforts were not a reaction to HB2 because they started the project last year.

Although a Duke Today article about the project said that gender-neutral bathrooms will only be designated in those buildings that already have single-stall restrooms and that no construction of new bathrooms will take place, Weisman noted that she aims to place gender-neutral facilities in every University building.

Currently, buildings without single-stall restrooms include CIEMAS, Wilson Gym, Brodie Gym and several buildings on East Campus.

“The ultimate goal is all buildings, particularly in the construction of new buildings,” Weisman said. “I hope that it becomes a priority to do new construction [of gender-neutral facilities], but I’m really happy with the progress that’s going to be made with the simple changing of signs.”

Restrooms of the highest priority will be receiving the new gender-neutral signage first, she explained. Four single-stall restrooms in the Allen Building and two in the Bryan Center have already been relabeled.

“I’m really excited about the change,” Antonicci said. “I think ensuring that we have gender-neutral bathrooms in all buildings, especially new buildings, will be an important next step. Of course, bathrooms are just one small part of the equation for inclusion of trans and gender-nonconforming people on campus.”

Soto also wrote that although gender-neutral bathrooms should be important to the community, Duke still has “a long way to go in order to ensure the safety of trans-identifying people on campus,” especially given the controversial HB2.

“What we must remember is that LGBTQ+ students, faculty, and staff are forced to exist on a campus where Pride flags are ripped down and heterosexism is deeply rooted,” he wrote.

Weisman and Soto said that DSG and BDU will continue to work with administrators throughout the process of designating gender-neutral facilities on campus.

“In the broader community, I hope it encourages conversation and more acceptance of diverse gender diversities or of folks who might need assistance,” Weisman said. “You can only hope that having a tangible change encourages a broader cultural change.”