On Oct. 18, there was a surprise taped on bathroom doors around campus. It was a pale pink sign that read, “These bathrooms are closed due to vandalism.” Almost a month later the bathrooms are still closed.

     All across the school, vandalism and graffiti have caused bathrooms to be locked. The number of locked versus unlocked bathrooms is changing every day. This is a major inconvenience to students who have to walk all the way across the school to use the restroom that would usually be right by their classroom. A student can walk to one bathroom in the school that was open yesterday, only for it to be locked today. 

     The new short passing period is not helping the problem either. 

     With only five minutes to get across the school in the busy and crowded hallway, it’s nearly impossible to use the restroom in that time. This means the only other option is to go during class time, and depending on where the nearest open bathroom is, it is going to take a decent amount of time to walk to the bathroom and back. Being gone from class for a solid five minutes means students are going to miss out on quite a bit of class time like instructions, work time and possibly even testing time.  

     Tigard students are not happy about the inconvenient bathroom closures.

     “There are only two working bathrooms in the school because of the quote unquote, ‘vandalism’. Why don’t they just fix the vandalism and let their students go to the freaking bathroom?” junior Brooke Baxter said.

     Sophomore Bailey Neal feels similarly. “It’s not fair for the students who have not done anything to face the punishment of people who can’t act responsibly,” Neal said. 

     What is so bad about this vandalism that it’s caused so many bathrooms to close?     

     Students aren’t even aware what sort of vandalism is going on. All they’ve been told is that there is “vandalism and graffiti,” nothing else besides that vague description. If they knew what the so-called vandalism was then they might possibly have a timeframe for when the bathrooms will be reopened. There is plenty of writing and graffiti on the stalls of the bathrooms that are still open. The stalls are filled with vulgar language, but apparently this vandalism doesn’t result in closures but in different bathrooms it does. Is the closure a punishment?

     Even Tigard High staff are displeased with the closures, specifically those located in the science and language halls which are located near one of the busiest, but currently closed, bathrooms. 

     Spanish teacher Jaquelyn Youngerman said, “It’s hard as a teacher because you don’t want to say no, you can’t go to the bathroom but at the same time, they’re going to be gone for a while, and some students are really great at catching themselves up and some aren’t.”  

     The bathrooms being locked is an issue that is annoying and inconvenient for everyone. If the closure is to fix the vandalism, it needs to happen sooner. If the closure is to punish students, the administration needs to think about who is really being punished.