Western University will provide $800,000 over a two-year period to expand the University Students’ Council (USC) Free the Dot menstrual program across the main campus as part of its 2022-23 operating budget.
This is the first time the university has invested in free menstrual products for students.
Free the Dot provides Western students with free access to pads, tampons, menstrual cups, liners, condoms and dental dams. The products can be picked up at any washroom in the University Community Centre and can now be delivered directly to students’ homes.
According to Madison Osborne, vice-president of student support and programming for USC, the program launched in 2019.
“It was a two-month pilot project where period products were available in washrooms in the university community centre,” said Osborne. “I started to play with what a really accessible period product program would look like on our own campus that would empower students to make decisions about their menstrual health.”
Within a one-week span, Free the Dot had received more requests for menstrual products and contraceptives than typically seen at the food bank for any kind of support in an entire year, according to Osborne.
“We’ve also received a lot of great feedback from students who are saying that often they’ve had to choose between menstrual products or groceries, or they’re having to extend the life of their period products because they can’t afford to buy them,” said Osborne. “Now it’s not an issue for students in the way that it has been in the past.”
As the COVID-19 pandemic first hit the province in March 2020, the USC worked to find a way to continue offering free menstrual products to the student population.
“Periods don’t stop because of COVID,” said Osborne. “We started mailing pads, tampons, panty liners, menstrual cups, as well as contraceptives out to students for free directly to their homes. It’s a confidential program as the packaging doesn’t have any identifying information on it.
“We really wanted to ensure that students still had access to the period products that they needed, even when they couldn’t come to campus.”
Over the past academic year, the USC says its university affairs portfolio actively worked to advance menstrual equity on campus.
Efforts included integrating a recommendation that “Western University offer students access to free menstrual products into three separate advocacy submissions between September 2021 and March 2022,” through the university’s sexual and gender-based violence action committee, among other things.
“We are beyond thrilled that our advocacy has had an impact and that Western has recognized the importance of providing free menstrual products to the student community,” says Ziyana Kotadia, USC vice-president university affairs.
“Ensuring that menstrual products are free and accessible to students who need them will reduce financial and social barriers to education that menstruators experience and build a culture where we can all feel empowered to move through spaces on campus with a sense of belonging.”