{"id":22457,"date":"2022-03-30T08:51:28","date_gmt":"2022-03-30T15:51:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=22457"},"modified":"2022-04-01T10:12:25","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T17:12:25","slug":"camosun-students-start-petition-to-get-college-to-provide-free-menstrual-products","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2022\/03\/30\/camosun-students-start-petition-to-get-college-to-provide-free-menstrual-products\/","title":{"rendered":"Camosun students start petition to get college to provide free menstrual products"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update: Since this story was filed, Camosun student Michelle Reed informed\u00a0Nexus<\/em> that dispenser machines will be installed in 9 locations across both campuses as early as June, and the products are coming from local environmentally friendly company Joni. Reed says that signage will be placed to advertise the dispenser machines.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As part of a collaborative class assignment, Camosun College students Michelle Reed, Julia Dillon, Roxanne LayCraft, and Steph McAulay have created a petition for access to free menstrual products on both Camosun College campuses.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were able to have the opportunity to choose a project to work on and we decided that this was something that all four of us felt very strongly about, that we have to pay for those products,\u201d says Michelle Reed, a student in her second year of the Community, Family, and Child Studies program at Camosun.<\/p>\n

The students launched a petition\u2014open to current and former Camosun students\u2014on change.org that they promoted on various social media channels. As of press time, it has received 245 signatures.\u00a0Realizing that there was a large demand for this, the students sent an email outlining the purpose and goals of the petition to Camosun director of student affairs Evan Hilchey and director of learning services Sybil Harrison. The group has since received a response from Hilchey and Harrison and had a meeting with them on Monday, March 28 to discuss the next steps.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Camosun students Roxanne LayCraft, Steph McAulay, Michelle Reed, and Julia Dillon with Camosun\u2019s Sybil Harrison and Evan Hilchey (photo provided).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to be discussing how this is going to be moving forward and how we\u2019re going to implement this not only at Lansdowne, but at Interurban,\u201d says Reed. \u201cWe\u2019re feeling pretty pumped, pretty excited right now that this is actually a reality, it\u2019s going to be happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reed says that the reason why her group, and other current and former Camosun students, feel so strongly about this is because having access to menstrual products in public restrooms is a basic human right, and that these products should be readily available, for free, just like soap, toilet paper, and paper towels.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not choosing to have periods every month, this is something that happens to us, just like bodily functions,\u201d she says. \u201cThis is something that is a basic human need and a basic right that we should have.\u201d<\/p>\n

The group has taken an inclusive approach to the assignment, and aims for these supplies to be offered in all washrooms across both campuses.<\/p>\n

\u201cWomen aren\u2019t the only people who menstruate. We want to make sure that this is not only in women’s washrooms, but also the non-gender washrooms, and we\u2019d actually like to have them in the men\u2019s washrooms as well,\u201d says Reed. \u201cSomebody who identifies as a man who does not want to go into the other two washrooms, because that is his right, but he is a menstruator, should have the option of being able to have those products accessible to him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The students want to see Camosun partner with, and source the menstrual products from, a local, environmentally-friendly company that doesn’t use toxic materials in its products. In terms of where the funds for the initiative will come from, the group ensures that it will not be from student fees, as another large factor in their desire to start the campaign stems from the stress and financial burden that inaccess to menstrual products can have on students.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would like money allocated annually from Camosun College\u2019s budget to ensure that these products are well-stocked, and that this money is not taken from student tuition fees, because that is completely going against what we\u2019re wanting to do,\u201d says Reed. \u201cThis is something that should be alleviating financial burden for people.\u201d<\/p>\n

The group has also sent their email outlining the initiative to BC minister of advanced education and skills training Anne Kang in hopes of seeing a province-wide policy change in post-secondary institutions.<\/p>\n

The petition can be found here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Update: Since this story was filed, Camosun student Michelle Reed informed\u00a0Nexus that dispenser machines will be installed in 9 locations across both campuses as early as June, and the products are coming from local environmentally friendly company Joni. Reed says that signage will be placed to advertise the dispenser machines. As part of a collaborative […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22458,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-webexclusive","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22457"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22509,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22457\/revisions\/22509"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}