2024 will kick off with menstrual product requirement in boy and girl school bathrooms

A new law requiring Minnesota public schools to stock free menstrual products in bathrooms used by students in 4th through 12th grade goes into effect Jan. 1, 2024. The requirement was one of the first bills given a hearing by both the House and Senate Education Policy Committees this past legislative session.

Menstrual products include “pads, tampons, or other similar products used in connection with the menstrual cycle.” School districts must develop a plan to make the products available in the boy and girl bathrooms “regularly” used by students, according to the law.

Districts receive “$2 times the adjusted pupil units of the school district for the school year” to pay for the menstrual products.

During a House Education Policy Committee on the bill this past January, an amendment to add the word “female” before the student reference was rejected (“…in restrooms regularly used by female students in grades 4 to 12…”). “Not all students who menstruate are female,” bill author Rep. Sandra Feist stated. “This [the amendment] is just another way to divide people in our schools,” added Thomas Stinson, a licensed school nurse at Harding High School.