What do women really want? Trash cans. Yes, tiny trash cans or bins in bathroom stalls.

 

“In all public restrooms – anywhere – there are little trash cans you can use when you’re on your menstrual cycle,” Grace Gemar, a senior studying biology, says. “Even at the janky gas stations.”

 

The lack of trash cans in bathroom stalls on Milligan’s campus leaves ladies either flushing their used feminine products down the toilet – which has a negative impact on the environment and causes damage to the sewage system – or carrying them in stealth-like fashion to a trash can outside the stall.

 

“It’s kind of awkward and unhygienic,” Mitchell Marquez, a junior studying Humanities, says. “A lot of girls end up using their dorm bathrooms, because it’s much more convenient.”

 

Women account for 63 percent of the student body at Milligan while men account for only 37 percent, according to U.S. News & World Report. For these ladies, the uncomfortable voyage from stall to restroom hall has become the “walk of shame.” And Gemar is surprised this is even an issue on campus.

 

“It’s like not having soap in bathrooms or something,” Gemar says.

 

Bethany Witherspoon, a freshman studying Bible, also finds the situation “irritating,” because, out of the 18 public restrooms The Stampede visited on Milligan’s campus, only one had a bin for women who are menstruating. The bin – which sits in between two stalls – can be found in the Paxson Communications Center.

 

Women use 20 or so tampons while on their cycle and 300-420 tampons or pads a year, according to The Diva Cup website. So, the women on campus say bins aren’t only convenient – they’re necessary.

 

Milligan’s Student Government Association brought the issue to the attention of the service manager of housekeeping last spring through a formal proposal, but there hasn’t been much talk about the proposal since.

 

Because the proposal was submitted so late into the semester, SGA member Somang Lee, who is a political science and business sophomore, says many have just forgotten about it.

 

And according to Jason Onks, the director of campus activities, finding a solution also involves the college coming up with the finances to pay for the extra cans.

 

“Housekeeping supported having more (trash cans) in the bathrooms but did not have the money,” Onks explained in an email last Wednesday.

 

SGA leaders decided a cost-effective plan might mean purchasing trash cans over time in order to “soften the budget impact.”

 

While the proposal hasn’t really been on SGA leaders’ radar this semester, Onks says the student affairs committee now plans on reviewing the proposal and will prioritize which bathrooms “get the first installment of the additional cans.”

 

Though the ladies hope to see changes made soon, they realize this is very much a “first-world feminist issue.”

 

“I understand other women go through much worse,” Gemar says.