In a continuing effort to provide teenage girls in public high schools and middle schools across the city with free feminine hygiene products, a pilot program has been rolled out that will give girls in 25 schools in Queens and the Bronx access to free tampons in dispensers installed in the schools’ bathrooms.
The program will serve 25 middle schools and high schools throughout District 24 in Queens and District 9 in the Bronx, affecting primarily low-income neighborhoods including Corona, Glendale, Ridgewood, Elmhurst, Grand Concourse and Tremont.
According to the Daily News, this pilot program was inspired by a successful free-tampon program launched last year at the High School for Arts and Business in Corona.
Implementation of this program began on March 14, and will reach nearly 11,600 students by its completion at the end of the month.
According to the Department of Education (DOE), this new program will cost approximately $160,000 this year, and could be expanded to more schools depending on the pilot program’s success.
