‘Everything is better’: Teacher shows reality of gender-neutral bathrooms in schools
In a viral video, a Minnesota teacher shows the setup of a gender-neutral bathroom in a public school.
The state's House of Representatives passed legislation in the spring to allocate funding to public schools to create gender-neutral restroom facilities.
In a TikTok posted on Tuesday, a teacher who goes by Ms. B online shows how a gender-neutral bathroom is set up at a school in her district. The facility has see-through glass that looks into the hallway and separate, lockable stalls with room for students to hang their backpacks.
The bathroom is also monitored by cameras that capture activity in the common area—not in the stalls.
"This is amazing. It is so much safer, so much cleaner," Ms. B says in her video. "Everything is better."
On Thursday, Ms. B's video had over 450,000 views on TikTok.
@tlcwithmsb I love this #gendernuetral #publicschool #teacherlife #inclusion #safety ♬ original sound - 🌸Ms. B🌸 Education + Travel
The bathroom Ms. B showed in her TikTok was built five years ago, but more gender-neutral bathrooms could be coming to Minnesota public schools: In April, the state's House of Representatives passed an education spending bill that would appropriate money for "gender-neutral, single-user restroom and locker room facilities" in public schools.
The bill has not yet been transmitted to the state's Senate. The bill is sponsored by Rep. Alicia Kozlowski, who is nonbinary.
There are many reasons why the gender-neutral bathrooms shown in Ms. B's video can benefit students: In a follow-up TikTok, she talks about how cameras monitoring the bathroom's common areas eliminate opportunities for bullying, violence, sexual assault, and drug use.
"Overall, there are way more benefits than drawbacks to this type of bathroom scenario," Ms. B says.
Ms. B told the Daily Dot she wasn't able to comment on her video without permission from the school district where she works.
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