After more than a year on the books, Connecticut’s menstrual equity law jumped into the national spotlight last month after a tampon dispenser in a boys’ bathroom at Brookfield High School was allegedly destroyed 20 minutes after it was installed.

The incident was swiftly condemned by the school’s principal, but debate over the policy that led to the dispenser’s installation lingered, drawing the attention of national news outlets, conservative commentators and Elon Musk.

The law, which ultimately passed in 2022 as part of a massive budget package, requires all schools to provide free menstrual products to students in grades three through 12, “in women’s restrooms, all-gender restrooms and at least one men’s restroom,” by Sept. 1, 2024, as a way to combat period poverty in Connecticut classrooms.

Discontent and disbelief over the menstrual equity law have brewed among Republican lawmakers since its passage.

“Why is the state forcing schools to install these machines? Because this is just another attempt to push a progressive ideology that neither I, nor many parents within the District, agree with,” Rep. Gale Mastrofrancesco said in a statement last April after the Wolcott School District installed menstrual product dispensers in the boys’ bathroom of an elementary school.

“There are biological boys and biological females. Offering female products to young boys is ridiculous, and only causes confusion at a young age,” Mastrofrancesco added. “We’re talking about grammar school students and what the state should be worried about is teaching reading, writing, science and math.”

Last June, Sen. Rob Sampson introduced an amendment that would have struck down the requirement that schools offer products in at least one men’s restroom, it failed in a vote that fell along party lines.

In a statement to the Courant last week, Sampson questioned why the state would mandate access to menstrual products in boys’ bathrooms starting in third grade.

“That doesn’t begin to make sense,” Sampson said. “As the leading defender of civil liberties in the state legislature, I can say with confidence that people are not angry at how others choose to live their lives. We embrace that as Americans. They do, however, have a problem with the clear intention to promote a controversial political agenda in our public schools, particularly when it involves innocent children.”

Advocates argue that the legislation comes down to equity and need, pointing to the fact that certain students and staff who use the men’s bathroom, including those who are transgender, nonbinary or intersex, may menstruate and need access to period products.

“This is about meeting a need for folks where they are when they need it,” Janet Stolfi Alfono said. “These are simple everyday items that we hope will not cause issues for those who don’t feel comfortable around them.”

Stolfi Alfono is the executive director of the Diaper Bank of Connecticut, a nonprofit organization that also runs the Connecticut Chapter of the Alliance for Period Supplies and advocated for the passage of the menstrual equity law in 2022.

“At the core, what this bill is about is giving those who menstruate access to the supplies that they need where and when they use them,” she said. “No one should feel that they have to go to a special location or a different location other than where they use the restroom to access those supplies.”

While some districts have already started to roll out the program, others are taking a back seat until the mandate officially kicks in.

“To my knowledge, very few districts implemented the program early and most are waiting for the start of the new school year,” Sherri DiNello, the director of government affairs for the Connecticut Association of School Business Officials said.

DiNello said the reason for this is twofold. The deadline for implementation is Sept. 1, 2024. Additionally, DiNello said schools were anticipating funding to offset the costs of the program, which they have yet to receive.

In 2022, CASBO estimated that menstrual products would cost districts $100 per female student per year and an additional $300 in upfront costs for dispenser installation in each restroom. CASBO also warned that the financial impact could grow “even higher due to potential issues with overuse and vandalism.”

To ease the burden on districts, the legislature voted last session to push the program’s implementation date from Sept. 1, 2023, to 2024. Lawmakers also allocated $2 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds to the Department of Public Health for the purchase of period supplies.

In a statement to the Courant, Chris Boyle, the director of communications for the department, said DPH is “in the contracting process” for a request for proposal for a vendor that can purchase and distribute menstrual products for the program.

“The RFP was designed for the contracted entity to provide products to schools, with a distribution model that will bring menstrual products directly to students using an equity-based approach,” Boyle said.

Rep. Kate Farrar said she is hopeful the distribution will finish in time for the start of the 2024 school year. To her knowledge, Farrar said the legislature is not planning to extend the program’s deadline.

“I have heard nothing that would tell me that there is going to be a further delay,” Farrar said.

Farrar, who championed the menstrual equity bill through its introduction and passage, said the legislation was driven by the needs and advocacy of students.

“Students around the state made clear that they want access to these products in as much of an inclusive way as possible in their school,” Farrar said.

According to the 2023 State of the Period survey commissioned by PERIOD. and Thinx, Inc., 23% of teens reported struggling to afford period products. Roughly 44% reported “stress and embarrassment” due to a lack of access, and 25% said they were unable to do schoolwork because they lacked products.

Stolfi Alfano said Connecticut students spoke up about these challenges and stigma.

“We heard directly from young people that this was something that they encountered in the schools,” she said.

Stolfi Alfono said that tampons and pads, like other personal hygiene products, are essential.

“If you think about it, fundamentally it’s like toilet paper,” Stolfi Alfano said. “It should be (accessible) where and when you use it and need it. And nothing like that should stop someone from attending school, participating in sports or any other activity for that matter.”

Stolfi Alfano said that students expressed that they did not want to go to the nurse for a tampon or pad, they wanted to have the products right there in the bathroom.

Stolfi Alfano explained that requesting products presents unnecessary obstacles and can take time out of a student’s instruction.

In many districts it requires students to first ask their teacher for a pass to the nurse, which can come with uncomfortable questions, and then a walk to the nurse’s office and oftentimes another walk, back to the bathroom.

In other districts, even that process is out of reach for students depending on the day and time — Stolfi Alfano said that not every school employs a full-time, on-site nurse, a reality that Paula Feyerharm, the president of the Association of School Nurses of Connecticut, confirmed.

Feyerharm said school nurses support the menstrual equity legislation which she described as a law that “promotes the dignity” of students.

“Menstruation is not a medical concern, it’s a natural part of life,” Feyerharm said. “There shouldn’t be any stigma associated with it, but a child shouldn’t have to go ask somebody for a product that they can manage on their own.”

For students who do feel more comfortable talking to a nurse, Feyerharm said most school nurses will continue offering supplies in their offices even after the law goes into effect. But, she acknowledged that there are students who do not feel comfortable requesting a tampon or pad.

“I’m sure in some of our schools that there are definitely students who probably need products and make do with probably wads of toilet paper because again, it’s a normal activity of daily living. And unless they have, you know, maybe a need of a change of clothes, they probably manage on their own,” Feyerharm said.

Feyerharm emphasized that students can experience period poverty in any district.

“A lot of times when we talk about poverty, we talk about specific pockets of the state, but we are now in new financial times where some families that are kind of right on that cusp might be now facing financial decisions at the grocery store and at the big box stores as to how much of anything that they can purchase,” Feyerharm said. “This will hopefully promote that period equity.”

She added that increasing the availability of menstrual products will benefit students and staff.

“A very large portion of the population of the world menstruates. It’s a normal natural process. And having the supplies available and visible in bathrooms just normalizes the process,” Feyerharm said.

Kirill Ivan Staklo is a suicidologist and the program director at PeerPride, a trans-run support and advocacy organization based in Connecticut.

Ivan Staklo said the ultra-feminine associations with periods can make menstruating emotionally difficult for people who do not identify as female.

“It’s not something that is a pleasant experience for most people in general, and it has a particular impact on dysphoria for a lot of men and nonbinary people,” he said.

When these individuals get their period, if they do not readily have access to products, Ivan Staklo explained that getting supplies can be difficult in the moment.

“Do you go in the women’s room? Do you send a friend? What do you do?” Ivan Staklo said.

Ivan Staklo said offering period supplies in both male and female bathrooms can help reduce these anxieties.

“You should have access to anything that you need to take care of your body that anybody else has,” Ivan Staklo said. “Having hygiene products in all bathrooms does an important thing where it normalizes that what your body does has nothing to do with your gender.”

Ivan Staklo said the matter is one of “nondiscrimination and equity.”

In addition to expanding access to boys’ bathrooms, Ivan Staklo stressed the importance of ensuring that products remain available in other spaces, like nurses’ offices, so students can obtain supplies in a way that feels safest to them.

Ivan Staklo said that many of the students in PeerPride’s Trans Haven program have experienced harassment and assault outside and within bathrooms in Connecticut schools.

When asked about whether period products in boys’ bathrooms could potentially lead to more incidents, Ivan Staklo the concern is “very real” but it is “the responsibility of Connecticut schools and schools across the country to make sure that their students aren’t being attacked.

“Instead of us debating whether or not having access to basic hygiene products would put a target on trans kids’ backs, I think we need to ask why aren’t our schools taking better care of our kids and making sure that they’re not being harassed?”

Ivan Staklo stressed the importance of LGBTQ+ inclusion in the sex education curriculum to ensure that “the information that’s given to people in the classroom is consistent with how trans people are protected in the culture” and policies of a school.

Ivan Staklo described the period equity law as “An opportunity for people who say that they want to stand up for trans people…to really show that Connecticut does stand behind trans people and to not allow these types of basic needs to be stripped from us.”