Grant High School Installs Unisex Bathrooms for Transgender Students

By AARON MESH

Grant High School has become the first Portland Public Schools location—and one of the first high schools in the country—to install unisex bathrooms for its transgender students.

An article in the student-run Grant Magazine broke the story Thursday that the biggest high school in Portland has designated six single-stall bathrooms—four for students and two for teachers.

Emily Volpert's story says Grant administrators made the decision because the school's 10 transgender students were uncomfortable using the men's or women's restrooms.

"Gendered bathrooms present an issue for any gender nonconforming people, whether or not they identify as transgender," Becca Dorn-Medieros, the school psychologist, tells the magazine. "It's a huge safety issue for people."

Unisex bathrooms in high schools are becoming a national talking point after controversies in Massachusetts and Colorado, but Grant is one of the first schools to make the switch.

Read the Grant Magazine story—which tells how one student wouldn't drink liquids all day to stay out of the bathrooms—here.

WWeek 2015

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