Library staff seek to accommodate trans and non-binary students

The women’s restroom sign was replaced with an all-gender restroom sign on the first floor of the Francis A. Drexel Library over winter break.

The library staff, in consultation with SJU Pride, The Alliance and the Transgender Working Group, spent several weeks discussing how to offer another service to all its users, according to Anne Krakow, the director of the library.

“[The new bathroom] is more in line with our mission to create a safe, comfortable, accommodating space,” Krakow said. “It just fits in line with who we are.”

There are currently 36 gender-neutral restrooms throughout campus.

Unlike other all-gender restrooms on campus, many of which are single-person bathrooms or only have two stalls, the relabelled restroom has five stalls. Kerry Dowd ’20, president of SJU Pride, said just changing the sign on a pre-existing bathroom is more impactful than a newly constructed all-gender bathroom.

“I think having [the bathroom] there, and in such a public place, even just for students to walk past and see it, will definitely change the atmosphere of the conversation about all-gender bathrooms on campus,” Dowd said.

The library staff has placed a small easel outside the bathroom describing what an all-gender restroom means and added two temporary signs inside that bathroom with an explanation.

According to Christopher Heasley, Ph.D., head of the Transgender Working Group, an all-gender bathroom is not just for students that identify as transgender but for all students who use the library.

“The more students, faculty, staff and administration on campus that feel comfortable using a facility that is labeled “all-gender,” the more accepting the community is going to be to having more facilities like that come on campus,” Heasley said.

An all-gender restroom was previously located in the basement of the library and students needed to request a key from a library staff member to use it.

“The basement is uncomfortable for the reason that students don’t even know that there is a basement in the library,” Dowd said. “It felt really secluding and isolating.”

The move from the basement to the main floor of the library makes the bathroom even more meaningful. According to Heasley, the new all-gender bathroom represents more than just another facility that accommodates students who identify as transgender on campus.    

“[The move] just says something about acceptance and really wanting to appreciate and celebrate diversity when it is accessible in a place that everyone can get to easily,” Heasley said.

Dowd said the addition of a public restroom to an essential academic and social hub of campus will hopefully be the first step in an effort to establish more regulations that support students who identify as transgender. 

“I hope that this bathroom just sparks a change in the gender neutral housing regulations,” Dowd said. “Somehow, even just starting with the bathroom in the library, is sparking that change.”