Cesar Chavez students and staff may have noticed that restroom breaks are taking much longer this year than in the prior years. Sadly, the bathroom crisis cannot be blamed on the pandemic or not wearing masks. Two bathrooms simply are not enough for a population of 2343 students.

The restriction of a majority of the bathroom sections has more of a negative impact than a positive one. Most staff members would believe that the fewer bathrooms needed to be monitored, would make the campus safer and prevent students from skipping classes. But the restriction on the restrooms is actually the cause of students not being in class.

As a current student at Chavez, I have had to deal with walking across the whole campus just to use the restroom many times. By that time span, I would have missed a good chunk of my class. This would lead to some teachers believing that we’re just ditching class, when in reality we have to wait in long lines, with only one restroom on the entire campus open.

A simple walkthrough of our campus will reveal that there are restrooms that could be used in the following buildings: G Building outside, C building upstairs outside, F building multiple inside, E building downstairs inside, D building inside upstairs, A building multiple inside, H building multiple inside. 

A typical student that has an English course in the M wing would have to walk all the way across campus to the A building to use the restroom. The Oracle verified that needing to use the restroom from the M wing will take roughly 3 minutes and 42 seconds to walk each way to the restroom. That results in a 7 minute and 24-second walk in the middle of class. If you add in the wait for the restroom due to the insanely long lines, plus the time to use the restroom then we are looking at around 15 to 20 minutes for a single restroom break for a Chavez student.

Think of it like this, if a student really wanted to miss class, they would find a way to avoid it as much as possible. So why keep most of the restrooms closed if the issue still continues? Our issue is that the school’s policy is allowing the situation to worsen, leading the students to miss even more class than intended, just to use the restroom.

Why make the situation of missing class time worse, when we can make a change, and improve the situation now? Refrain from keeping only one class building’s section open. There are over 2300 students on this campus, and some of them truly need to use the restroom and do not enjoy missing out on work only to catch up with it later because restrooms are closed.

Who wants to go use the restroom, wait in long lines that make In and Out blush, just to come back to class with a stack of paperwork and information you missed out on. Let’s take a step forward to allow students to conveniently use the restroom and go back to class on time where they are actually supposed to be.