Bathroom doors removed at Maryland high school to curb smoking, vaping

A high school in Maryland has removed the doors leading into several bathrooms to discourage students from discreetly smoking and vaping, drawing complaints from pupils who say the decision is detrimental to their privacy.

School officials removed the doors to nearly half the bathrooms this week at Broadneck High School in Annapolis, Maryland, in response to students increasingly smoking and vaping inside, local media reported Friday.

“Broadneck High School has experienced an increasing number of violations of the Code of Student Conduct in bathrooms,” Anne Arundel County Public Schools said in a statement. “In response, the school installed doorstops two weeks ago and propped doors open ONLY on bathrooms where to do so would not invade student privacy. Those doorstops were unfortunately kicked off, so the school earlier this week removed doors on those bathrooms.”

“It’s unfortunate that it came to that,” said Bob Mosier, the county schools spokesman, The Capital Gazette reported.

District officials said not a single parent complained in the three days after the doors were removed Tuesday, though several students have already sounded off against the school’s decision.

“It’s inconvenient and embarrassing,” said Broadneck senior Sarah Noble, 17. “Taking the door off the bathroom isn’t hard,” she told The Capital Gazette. “Talking to students and getting across to them is.”

“It’s just overall frustrating because its invading our privacy,” agreed Broadneck sophomore Amaya Fairley. “Schools not exactly a private place and the bathrooms is the one place that gives us privacy,” she told WMAR2 News.

Broadneck officials decided to remove the bathroom doors to keep students from smoking, vaping and “juuling” inside, local media reported. Juuling refers to using discreet nicotine vaporizers like the kind manufactured by a particular company, JUUL, currently popular among teenagers.

“We’re not the only school system that’s seeing that,” Mr. Mosier told The Gazette. “It’s an issue our principals are certainly aware of.”

District officials said the bathroom doors at Broadneck will remain removed until further notice, WBAL-TV reported. The school only removed doors from bathrooms where stalls could not be seen from the hallway, Mr. Mosier told The Gazette.

Broadneck has a total enrollment of over 2,000 students in grades nine through 12, according to U.S. News and World Report.