Kenmore Middle School student urges PGCPS to ensure period-product dispensers in middle and high school bathrooms

Beatrice Teager, an eighth grader at Kenmore Middle School, told the Prince George's County Public Schools Policy & Governance Committee on Feb. 25 that she is asking the district to implement a formal policy and ensure dispensers with period products are installed and stocked in all middle and high school bathrooms.

Teager said she is pursuing the change as part of a Girl Scouts Silver Award project and that she surveyed 65 students from 12 PGCPS middle and high schools. She told the committee that 32% of respondents said their school did not have period products available, 16% said products were available from bathroom dispensers, 39% reported missing school or leaving early because they lacked access, and 98% said having products available at school was important.

“This bill requires school districts install dispensers in bathrooms and provide period products at all middle and high schools,” Teager said during her three-minute public comment. She said that when she checked the bathrooms in her new school she “could not find a dispenser” and that even when dispensers are installed they are often empty.

Teager asked the board to direct facilities to check every middle and high school for dispensers, provide a list of schools that need dispensers, allocate specific funding to stock them, and set up a simple reporting mechanism (for example, a QR code) for students to report empty dispensers. She said she would submit her written testimony and a link to the questionnaire she used.

Committee members thanked Teager for her comment; no formal action or vote on a policy or motion was recorded during the meeting on this subject. The committee did not take regulatory or funding action at the Feb. 25 meeting; Teager said she would pursue conversations with her principal and submit written materials to the board.