Universal bathroom signs have been posted in all buildings on campus, 2018. Photograph: Soham Parikh/The Guardian
Six bathrooms on campus are now accessible for all genders.
The restrooms themselves will stay the same, according to Daniel Palmer, president of Student Government Association (SGA). They will simply be re-signed to indicate that they are now all-gender restrooms, like those in the lower level of the Student Union near the Rainbow Alliance office.
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Locations of the restrooms to be changed include:
* The first floor of the Student Success Center
* Near the elevator on the first floor of the Creative Arts Center
* Near the Berry Room on the second floor of the Nutter Center
* Near the Green Room in the Nutter Center
* Near the front entrance to the Tom Hanks Center for Motion Pictures
* Near the Bill Shepard Conference room in the Foundation Building
The changes were originally planned for the beginning of fall semester but were delayed due to a lack of manpower and labor resources, according to Palmer.
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Students reacted to the delay by voicing their concerns on Twitter via #ineedtopee. In response, SGA passed resolution 19-1 to remove the delay, claiming that "this delay denies the basic rights of transgender and gender non-conforming students to use restrooms and results in physical and mental trauma as well as negatively affects the educations of these students."
The student response was not intended to be defamatory to the university, according to Shree Gotteti, assistant director of international affairs at SGA. "If the students don't fight for their rights, things won’t change,” Gotteti said. “The Twitter hashtag was just a part of that continued protest and it was not intended to defame the university in anyway. They really just needed to pee."
"Going forward, we hope that the university will be better at making proactive decisions rather than reactionary ones," Palmer said. "This issue should have been resolved at the beginning of the year and it should not have needed a firestorm on Twitter to make it happen."
