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The North East Independent School District has adopted a new policy requiring all schools to stock feminine hygiene products after complaints arose at Lee High School.
Female students should always have access to those products, said Becky Rendon, North East health services director.
"We are going to a different school of thought for the coming school year, and they will be a standard supply item in our clinics," Rendon said.
In the spring, students at Lee High School complained that feminine hygiene products were not available at the school. Brenda Slatton, a Lee High School journalism teacher, has worked at the school for 10 years and doesn't remember there being a feminine hygiene product in the dispensers in the women's restroom or in the nurse's office.
"They don't see it as a priority," Slatton said.
In the spring, an article published in the Robert Lee High School student newspaper, Bugle Call, called attention to the problem. School nurse Melinda Ochoa was quoted in the story, citing reasons for the lack of products. She said it was because of bookkeeping issues and vandalism of the dispensers in the restrooms.
Other schools throughout the school district offer hygiene products either for free or for a nominal fee, according to the article.
But students from at least one other school in the district said their school lacked feminine hygiene products for as long as they can remember. Zaeva Mercado said she has never seen feminine hygiene products at Roosevelt High School.
"Sometimes, you really need it because it (menstrual accidents) can come any time," the Roosevelt High School junior said.
Some students don't see it as a problem because they can ask a friend or bring their own supplies.
"I just ask my friends if they have some … (it's) not that big of a deal," Jackie Ybañez, a Roosevelt High School senior, said.
Other North East schools have varying ways of handling the matter. Reagan has a 25-cent dispenser in the nurse's office. Churchill also sells them for a quarter, but offers them for free in an emergency. Madison's PTA donates the hygiene products, which are provided to students free of charge. MacArthur's nurse offers only one free sanitary napkin or tampon.
After learning about the problem at Lee High School, Rendon took action and is now considering a bid to stock sanitary napkins in the nurse's office in every district school, elementary through high school.
Rendon said tampons are not provided because of cultural issues. A sanitary napkin is something everyone can use. Policies on supplying feminine hygiene products vary at other school districts.
"The decision to supply students with hygiene products is made by the principal on the campus level," Laura Vega said of the San Antonio School District policy.
Like North East School District, Northside School District only stocks the nurse's offices with sanitary napkins. Shirley Schreiber, Northside health services director, said the products are provided only for emergencies.
"We supply them, but we encourage the students to bring their own," Schreiber said.
The Judson Independent School District nurses "always try to accommodate the students' needs," said Sean Hoffmann, director of public information. "The nurses even provide the student an extra product to eliminate another trip to the clinic during the day."
The cost of providing feminine hygiene products during the 2009 fiscal year for Judson for 3,500 tampons and 6,250 sanitary napkins was $1,010, Hoffmann said.
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