#FreePeriod

Being Period Positive at the Billy Bee

At the end of last year, any regular visitors to The Bill Bryson Library will have noticed the ‘Period Positive Drive’ donation point near the entrance:

This initiative was a collaboration between The Student Wellbeing Team and Durham Students Union’ with the ultimate aim of providing sanitary and incontinence products to students and staff who are ‘caught short’ in a busy, central study area.

There were donation points at several locations around the campus and we also asked users to drop in a ping pong ball to show us whether they were aware that there were emergency supplies behind the Bill Bryson Help & Information desk – the picture below shows that the answer was overwhelmingly no – not helpful if you are caught out in an emergency!

After discussions with the Students’ Union and Student Wellbeing, we believe we’ve come up with a much easier to access service – you will now find emergency supplies in buckets in our gender-neutral, accessible toilets (also means you don’t have to visit the desk and communicate your dilemma to a complete stranger!)

We hope you find the #freeperiod service useful.  And watch this space for future period positive updates!