The sound of drilling echoed through the hallway during 2nd Period on Tuesday, Oct. 11 as CCPS Facilities employees installed new wood doors on all of the bathrooms.  The new doors come equipped with a dead bolt that can be locked by key from the outside and unlocked with a thumb-latch on the inside of the door.

“We installed the doors so we can easily shut down restrooms if needed,” Principal Shawn Abel said.  “If something is damaged, we are experiencing a leak, or we simply want to shut down a particular restroom.”

Administration closed down several bathrooms because of vandalism during the “Devious Licks” trend of 2021.

“We can shut the bathrooms down if they’re vandalized, need maintenance, and, in rare cases, safety.  [But] the restrooms cannot lock from the inside,” Building Operations Supervisor Michael Johnson said

The sudden installation of the doors caused students to speculate as to why the doors were installed.

“I’m confused why they’re there now because they never were there and now its altering when I can use the bathroom,” Elle Abel, 12, said.

Some students worried the bathrooms would be locked during class changes or immediately following a class change.  For Latin students, the class change provides the only time to use the restroom free of charge as the teacher requires them to pay one denarius, a Latin coin, to use the bathroom during class.  Students are limited to 4 coins per year.

“I would like to use the bathroom whenever I want without paying,” Maggie Royle, 12, said.

With the exception of lunch periods where students are required to use the gray bathrooms nearest the front office,  administration has no plans to close the bathrooms during peak usage periods.

“We are not just shutting down restrooms during class changes or during classes,” Abel said.