By Robyn Doolittle
Christine Akrey was in need of a tampon and Ryerson’s shiny new bathroom didn’t have one.
Akrey was back at Ryerson for her 25th Radio and Television Arts reunion and she was already feeling nervous. Four of her ex-boyfriends would be there with their wives, and some of her fellow alumni had become local celebrities. Now she found herself stranded in Jorgenson Hall’s newly renovated, fully automatic women’s washroom. The taps, hand dryer and even the soap are operated by motion sensors, but there isn’t a tampon dispenser and that was all that mattered at the moment.
“Yes it’s a nice bathroom, very aesthetically pleasing, but it’s not very functional,” she says.”When I was at Ryerson there were dispensers in these washrooms and they always have them at work.”
There are nearly 9200 undergraduate women enrolled at Ryerson this year and only 27 sanitary napkin and tampon dispensers scattered around Ryerson’s campus.
Ayo Akinola, 18, a second-year business studente says that by this stage, she knows better than to come unprepared.
“I’ve been dealing with this since I was nine years old, so I always have my emergency stash ready,”she says.” Ryerson should have the dispensers in all of the washrooms, but I’m not surprised they don’t. I find most public bathrooms don’t have them and if they do they’re normally broken.”
Lillian Begovic is the sales manager for Cannon Hygiene, supplier of Ryerson’s sanitary napkins and tampons. She says there is a major problem with the dispenser units; people break into them to steal the money. ”
A replacement machine can cost up to $300, so…Ryerson may not have them in every single washroom.”
Many of the bathrooms in Kerr hall do not have dispensers, but well stocked machines can be found in the Rogers building and at the north end of Jorgenson Hall.
Akrey was lucky, after rummaging through her purse she found an old tampon stashed away in the inside pocket. Now all she has to worry about are those ex-boyfriends.
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