Showering alongside the opposite sex will now be an option for some students living in Kilgo Quadrangle next year.
Residence Life and Housing Services staff selected the third floor of House O and House P in Kilgo Quad as the location for a new gender-neutral bathroom next semester. Approved by a unanimous Campus Council vote last Thursday, the bathroom joins co-ed blocking in an effort to further integrate gender-neutral living spaces in dorms.
"We've known that this is a change students will endorse," said Marijean Williams, director of housing assignments and communications. "We're ready to move ahead now with a pilot program."
Although a gender-neutral facility has been discussed before, student momentum heightened the issue's importance when a transgender student had difficulty with living options on West Campus this Fall, she added.
For the upcoming year, the option of a gender-neutral bathroom will only be available in one area, Williams said. It will be located on a floor that also has a male and female bathroom for those who are more comfortable using a single-sex facility.
"We'll talk with students who live there and those who don't live there to try to determine if it's the best use of space for our students," Williams said.
Once the Room Pix process begins, any student who wants to sign up for the space will be notified either in person or online with a message designating the area's bathroom as gender-neutral, she added.
The council also recommended that two rooms with access to the facility initially be removed from the housing lottery and reserved for students who express strong interest in living in the area, said junior Kevin Thompson, vice president of Campus Council.
"We wanted to make sure that any student who wanted the bathroom or needed it could have access to it," he added.
Junior Daniel Harvey, a member of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Task Force, first met with Thompson at the end of last semester to discuss his goals for the restroom as an accommodation for students of all sexual orientations.
"I know that this is a step in the right direction for RLHS," he said. "A gender-neutral bathroom is a bathroom for everyone."
Christopher Purcell, program coordinator for the LGBT Center, said the new facility is also a way to increase options for all students.
"Certainly, [the bathroom] will help transgender students and any student who doesn't feel quite comfortable in all male or all female spaces, but anyone can use [it]," he said.
Other LGBT students, however, said they are disappointed that only one bathroom will be designated as gender-neutral, senior Katharine Eggleston said.
"It was our intention to have at least one [bathroom] in each quad so that students who need or strongly desire use of this facility would still be able to choose which quad to live in," she said.
For future semesters, Eggleston said she envisions all students voting to designate their hall's bathroom as gender-neutral at the same time that they vote on whether or not to unlock it.
"In my opinion, giving the option of gender-neutral halls would allow students to live with whom they feel most comfortable and may foster healthy and positive interactions between men and women on campus," she said.
Thompson said the bathroom is a progressive move for Duke, and he anticipates positive student reactions.
"There really will not be such a stigma associated with the bathroom because we're not creating a hall on certain values," Thompson said, adding that the bathroom will not be an inconvenience for those who do not wish to use it.
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