Education and community partners gathered to celebrate the official launch of the New Westminster School District's efforts to provide stigma-free access to menstrual products for all students.
"By reducing barriers for students to these necessary products, the New Westminster School District is making real changes in the lives of students," said Rob Fleming, Minister of Education. "Removing unnecessary and inequitable barriers for students is an important issue long advocated for by the United Way Period Promise campaign. This initiative is enthusiastically supported by all our partners, including the BC Green Party caucus, which also advocated for this change."
In February 2019, New Westminster school trustees voted unanimously to install coin-free menstrual product dispensers in all of its schools by September 2019, making them the first in the province to do so. Over the summer, more than three dozen dispensers were installed in all of the district's 12 schools, including gender-neutral washrooms. A total of 2,800 tampons and 1,800 napkins have been provided for the start of the 2019 school year.
Fleming issued a ministerial order in April 2019, requiring all B.C. public schools to provide stigma-free access to free menstrual products for students in school washrooms. A number of districts have already made these products available to students well ahead of the start of this school year.
"This is a welcome new initiative in our schools,” said Rebecca Ballard, a Grade 12 student at New Westminster Secondary school. “The fact that students have to pay for the fundamental and necessary products they need is stigmatizing, particularly for those who are vulnerable."
