Golden Grove High School toilet backflip after Modbury High caught in outcry

Two SA schools have been told to put the doors back on their bathrooms after photos stoked fresh outrage over their toilet policies.

High school students will be able to go to the loo in privacy after the Education Department ordered at least two schools to reinstall toilet doors.

It has also told all schools to ensure their toilets meet “privacy requirements”, following complaints some students were getting urinary tract infections because they were avoiding going to the loo.

Advertiser.com.au on Tuesday revealed another South Australian school has become embroiled in controversy, with pictures showing its toilets with the doors removed.

The photos from Modbury High School emerged days after Golden Grove High School principal Peter Kuss sent a letter to parents and caregivers alerting them to their toilets’ new doorless look.

The latest photos show urinals in plain sight from school corridors, while “a smell” had reportedly permeated the Modbury High hallways.

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Urinals at Modbury High School have been left exposed after the school removed external toilet doors. Picture: Supplied

Parents of students at Modbury High School say outside toilet doors have been locked to ensure students use internal toilets with removed doors. Picture: Supplied

The removal of toilet doors was not a directive of the Education Department but a matter for individual schools.

Golden Grove High is undergoing an upgrade and its principal wrote to parents saying the toilet doors in old blocks had been removed to “mimic as much as possible the new look and feel” of “lockable, non-gendered, individual cubicles” in a redeveloped part of the school.

“We believe this action will provide greater safety for student usage and will more closely align our older toilet blocks with the new standards,” Mr Kuss wrote.

A mother of two children attending Modbury High criticised both schools for removing the doors.

Allison, whose requested her last name be withheld, said privacy and use of toilets had been an issue for at least 12 months. She said some children “held it in” for so long they were developing urinary tract infections. Other students had resorted to urinating on walls.

Toilet cubicles at Golden Grove High School can be seen from the halls after the removal of external doors.

The mother said Modbury High had locked outside cubicles, forcing children to use toilets that had their external doors removed.

“This is putting children through psychological and physical distress and harm,” she said.

“The school just randomly took them off with no explanation to parents. I really worry for female students who find themselves in a situation where a friend needs to bring them something (female sanitary item) to help out. If other people see that, they can be subject to bullying.”

Allison raised the issue with the school, the department and former education minister John Gardner, but those queries had “fallen on deaf ears”.

Late Tuesday evening, a department spokesman said action had been taken.

“The department has requested that Golden Grove High replace the external doors on their older toilets,” he said.

“The department will also issue a reminder to all public education sites so they ensure their facilities meet privacy requirements.”