SASKATOON – The University of Saskatchewan (U of S) is now rolling out official gender-neutral bathrooms to help transgender individuals feel safer. Starting from early 2016, 100 single-stall washrooms on campus will be converted to more welcoming spaces that read, “Gender Neutral Accessible Washroom.”
Facilities management has agreed to fund the costs related to switching the signs. The idea came from Pride Centre coordinator Craig Freisen who points out that not everyone identifies with gender.
READ MORE: Catholic high school in Alberta switching to gender neutral washrooms
Freisen is also putting together a Google map for when the project is completed.
“Saying that we have them is one thing. But students actually being able to find out where these washrooms are, is another thing,” he said.
This isn’t the first time the signs on a public toilet have changed to be more inclusive. In public places all over the country, gender-neutral spaces are increasing.
Manuela Valle-Castro, a women and gender studies professor at U of S, believes the bathroom conversation opens up more opportunities for positive change.
“The bathroom is one of the ways we can start re-socializing ourselves, rethinking about gender, about sex and about what are the assumptions that are underlying the gendered bathrooms,” she said.
Jack Saddleback is a transgender person who says he’s heard stories of people being verbally and physically harassed for going to the bathroom and doing the basic of needs.
“We are so heavily invested in the gender binary, that being either male or female,” said Saddleback, University of Saskatchewan Students’ Union president.
“And if you fall outside of this idea of what it means to be male or female, it can be quite a volatile society to live in.”
The new Gordon Oaks Red Bear Students Centre will have universal bathrooms.
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