When nature calls, a fully stocked, clean bathroom is an ideal place to relieve the bladder; however, that is not the case here at Franklin. Many students have complaints about the conditions of the bathrooms and are upset at the lack of cleanliness and supplies.

In the girl’s bathroom, there are paper towels strewn on the floor, clogged toilets and sinks, and dysfunctional stalls. This may be the result of the students’ lack of responsibility for keeping the bathrooms clean.

“The students cause the mess and they’re lazy,” said junior Krystal Smith.

She is disappointed about the continuous lack of soap and paper towels as well.

“It’s ridiculous. There’s never any soap and rarely any paper towels,” said Smith. “And sometimes the doors don’t shut or they have a huge gap.”

There often tends to be very long lines in the bathrooms, especially in the mornings before second period. Luckily, the school keeps the bathrooms in HK and HM open during that time. Another complaint among students is that they are closed during the lunch hours. Those students who don’t have lunch during some of those periods are frustrated that they have to walk all the way to the opposite end of the campus to go to the bathroom.

“I hate that [those bathrooms are closed],” said junior Nick Martin. “And those are the ones that are clean!”

The reason why those bathrooms are closed is because during the lunch periods, there are 1,000 students out on campus.

“We don’t have enough campus supervisors to monitor by HK,” said Vice Principal Jeff Warshaw.

Whether the HK/HM bathrooms are open or not is the least of students’ worries. There are many problems with the sanitation of the bathrooms, especially the boys bathrooms.

“There are doo doo stains on the seats [and] pee stains all over the toilet dispensers,” said Martin.

There tends to be an excessive amount of urine on the floors as well. Because of this, many students choose to not use the bathrooms here on campus. They would rather hold it all day instead of use the messy bathrooms.

Despite all of the complaints from the students, it seems that the bathrooms really aren’t that different from the mens bathrooms at other locations.

“Looks like a boys bathroom at any other place. Not really that nasty,” said math teacher Steve Nickerson.

All of the problems have been brought to the officials’ attention and they have contacted the custodial staff to change the conditions.

“As soon as we found out about it, we talked to custodial staff. It wasn’t intentional. We want you to have soap,” said Warshaw.

According to Senate Bill 892, it is required for school bathrooms to be fully stocked with soap, toilet paper, and paper towels or working hand dryers. So students should expect to see a few upcoming changes in the restrooms.

Again, the aspect of not enough bathrooms comes into play for the staff as well. There are only two locations available for the teachers to use during the day, and one bathroom in each administrative building.

“When they’re needed, there aren’t enough and when they’re not, they sit idle,” said Nickerson.