No girl in city will miss school thanks to period poverty plans

PLANS are now in place to offer free sanitary products in all Glasgow schools to ensure no girl misses class due to period poverty.

Pupils from four Glasgow secondaries have been working on a pilot project that will now be rolled out to all primary and secondary schools.

As told in the Evening Times, work of female pupils from Hillpark Secondary, St Paul’s High, Castlemilk High and Smithycroft Secondary has shaped the council’s policy on period poverty.

Councillor Jennifer Layden, City Convener of Equalities and Human Rights, said: “This has been a brilliant piece of work by our pupils.

“What better way to tackle and issue than by empowering the very girls that will benefit from our policy.

“The girls looked at the specific issues relating to their school community, researched their audience and came up with viable solutions to any barriers they identified.

“Even in this day and age when no subject is seemingly taboo or off limits to young people – periods and sanitary protection can still be an embarrassing topic.

“Our schools have always provided pupils with sanitary products if required – but our new policy means that a range of products will be on hand without the need to ask anyone.

“The bottom line of our policy is that we want schools to be flexible in the roll out and develop a process that works best for their school community.

“Having to miss school, college or university because you can’t afford sanitary products is against a women’s human right to access education.

“Glasgow’s policy will put a stop to this and means that any girl in our schools – regardless of their personal circumstances – will never have to suffer the stigma of this again.”

In April, Scotland took a step to becoming the first country to outlaw “period poverty” by formally introduce legislation at Holyrood.

Monica Lennon’s Private Member’s Bill won the backing of each of the Scottish Parliament’s five parties, giving her the right to press forward.

Her Sanitary Products (Free Provision) (Scotland) Bill would create a statutory duty to ensure free access to the products, including in universities, schools and colleges.

Glasgow decided to get in ahead of the bill being introduced by having pupils in the four schools develop a period poverty scheme.

At St Paul’s Secondary pupils Aimee Chadha, Caitlin Grimley, Erin McGunnigle and Megan McManus, then in S2, formed a steering group.

The girls all said that, initially, talking to other pupils and staff about periods was awkward but they soon overcame any barriers.

Erin said: “I was a bit sceptical at first but then I learned about how many girls at my school are affected I realised we were doing the right thing.

“Ms McKenna [Glasgow’s Executive Director of Education] really listened to us and took all our points on board so there’s a feeling of pride that we are helping girls in other schools too.”

Megan was the first pupil to be approached by pastoral care teacher Patricia McGregor, who thought Megan would be the right pupil to lead the project.

Megan said: “I chose the other girls to help me because I knew they would be responsible and it was a worry, how other pupils would react.

“Would they be immature about it? How would it go down?

“But actually everyone reacted really well. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about and girls should be able to talk about periods.”

At one Glasgow school, 73 per cent of pupils said they knew of a girl unable to come to school because she was not able to afford sanitary protection.

The Scottish Government has provided £169,983 to the city council to pay for products and set-up charges for 2018/19, based on costs of £9.63 per girl in secondary schools.

This figure is based on a predicted uptake of 35 per cent in schools with the council pledging

Hey Girls – a Scotlandbased social enterprise – provided a range of products for the schools to try.

The company also produces a range of supplementary educational tools including booklets and posters that can be used as a learning resource in schools.

For every pack bought from the company, Hey Girls donate a pack free in order to tackle period poverty.

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It’s nothing to be embarrassed about and girls should be able to talk about periods