Feminism Club at WHS

By: Elena Rivas

The WHS Feminism Club was started by juniors Veronica McKenna and Mia Gugliotti and senior Ava Heimgartner, with the intention of talking about feminist issues and taking action in their community to make a difference, and providing those opportunities to young women. 

Last year, the Feminist Club held a charity drive for a shelter called My Sisters’ Place and they collected donations of over 1,000 pads, tampons, and diapers. This year, the Feminist Club has been putting feminine hygiene products in the bathrooms here at WHS for menstruators to use.

The bathrooms at our school don’t have a pad and tampon dispenser, so the Feminist Club has been collecting donations of pads and tampons to have in the bathrooms. Having these items in bathrooms have been a big success and have been very helpful for many. 

Mrs. McKenna said, “I've had lots of students and teachers say that it's been very helpful having it there and comforting knowing it's there just in case there's an emergency.”  Principal O’Connor is working with the town of Wethersfield now to get the pad and tampon dispenser installed into the bathrooms so that people who menstate can have access to these items. 

There's a group of Connecticut state legislators who want to create menstrual equity in Connecticut and part of that work would be to provide period products to public schools, state colleges and universities, jails, prisons and shelters. 

Mrs McKenna said, “Who knows if it would go through or not, but the fact that people are talking about it, and I think that what we did here brought awareness in our community that this is something that's needed. I think most women can relate but it's not something that people talk about and there's nothing to be ashamed of.” She continued to say, “I think that if we talk about it more and make it more of a common conversation it takes away that sort of stigma.” 

If you want to get involved with the Feminism Club, see Mrs. McKenna for any additional information in room 336 and feminine hygiene products can be donated in room 336. 

The legislation meeting March 9th- https://ctmirror.org/2022/02/18/we-can-end-period-poverty/ 
To learn more about My Sisters’ Place visit- https://sistersplacect.org/ 

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