Our Top Tips for Your Education Washrooms

Here at the Washroom Vanity Company, we understand that when it comes to creating or renovating your education washrooms, there are several considerations that will impact the end design – including, but not limited to, the age and volume of pupils. All education washrooms must be compliant with the regulations set out by the Department for Education, to ensure that they are fit for purpose and safe for the intended users.

To help you with a design plan for your education washrooms, we’ve collated our top tips to ensure your project is executed with ease.

Age specific solutions for education washrooms:

Initially, the target audience must be identified to ensure that the washroom is age appropriate. For nursery or primary school washrooms, it is crucial that the facilities are child-friendly and age-appropriate, to encourage independence when learning an important life skill.

Hand washing facilities should be narrow and fixed at a lower height in these types of education washrooms to ensure that children can easily reach the taps and soap dispensers to thoroughly wash their hands unassisted.

Our WT3 Slim – Flat Bottomed Thermoformed Wash Trough with Tap Deck and WT4 – Slim Bottomed Thermoformed Wash Trough without Tap Deck have been designed to comply with the regulations set out by the Department for Education. Featuring a slim design, younger children can easily access the tap deck, thus requiring less assistance from an adult.

Age must also be taken into consideration when designing cubicles. Naturally, washrooms in secondary schools and all the way up to university settings require full height cubicles to offer safety and privacy. In some instances, we are seeing these become more like individual Superloos, in an effort to meet demand for gender neutral toilets.

Acknowledging the age of the users is a vital step in designing education washrooms, in order to ensure the apparatus installed meet the needs of the different school years. We strive to encourage independence in the younger users, in addition to optimising security and privacy for adolescents and young adults.

Managing the numbers with education washrooms:

Much like having age-appropriate facilities, the number of potential users needs to be considered when designing a new washroom. Typically, KS1 children need to go to the toilet more frequently than those in KS2 and upwards.

Consequently, additional cubicles and longer hand washing basins would be necessary to accommodate a higher number of children using the wash station at once.

As young adults and grown-ups possess a better control of their bathroom habits, education washrooms in secondary schools and universities can feature fewer cubicles and shorter hand wash basins, as the bathrooms are often less congested.

Fortunately, our solid surface wash troughs are completely customisable in length, to adhere to all requirements and needs. A great benefit of solid surface is that it can be joined seamlessly, so even if the trough is over 3 meters long, it can be joined together onsite easily to meet the desired length.

Safe & secure education washrooms:

Education washrooms should be private environments where users feel safe, secure, and an environment that vulnerable users can feel is a safe space.

For the safety of all pupils, every tap should be fitted with TMV3 valves that are pre-set to 41 degrees – the ideal temperature for hand washing, ensuring maximum user hygiene, and including a failsafe to prevent scolding. It is recommended that all taps in education washrooms should also be non-concussive, or sensor operated, to avoid leaks and flooding caused by accidently leaving the taps on. You can view our range of taps here.

Unrivalled hygiene for education washrooms:

Undoubtedly, washrooms need to be hygienic environments. Particularly in an education setting, hygiene is paramount in order to minimise the spread of germs and bacteria, whilst also providing opportunities to educate children on hand washing hygiene.

For nursery and primary school children, immune systems are still developing. It is much harder for young children to combat infections, should they contract anything. Germs can easily be spread between children if regular hand washing is not practised and a clean environment is not maintained.

Whilst we would recommend using solid surface hand washing facilities in all sectors we operate in, it is an unmatched material for education washrooms. Some of its features include:

• Non-pourous
• Bacteria is unable to harbour and thrive
• Seamless, smooth finish
• Easy cleaning

We have learnt through the recent Coronavirus pandemic that a key way of spreading germs is through touch, so the best way to achieve a hygienic environment is to minimise the touch points that users may meet. Sensor operated accessories, like taps, soap dispensers and hand dryers significantly reduce the risk of spreading germs to other users. So, employing these kinds of accessories in a school washroom is a great way to maximise hygiene.

Water saving features for education washrooms:

Previously, The Department for Education advised that vanity units were a suitable solution to handwashing in the education sector. However, as more leaks and flooding occurred with individual basins inefficiently coping with the demand of high traffic areas in school washrooms, they advised trying a different route.  

In their most recent recommendations, the Department for Education advised wash troughs as the preferred choice for hand wash basins within the education sector, and using solid surface to do this has never been easier.

Wash troughs are aesthetically pleasing and easy to clean and maintain, but most importantly, they are less likely to flood. These sinks offer a significantly larger surface area for water to be effectively contained to reduce splashing. Furthermore, solid surfaces can be joined seamlessly, mitigating the risk of leaks by reducing the amount of exposed joins.

When we pair solid surface wash troughs with non-concussive or sensor operated taps, the risk of flooding in education washrooms is significantly reduced. In the long run this will save time, money and will contribute to less water usage and reduce environmental impact.  

For more information on your education washroom project or to discuss anything further, please contact us at [email protected] and a member of our team will be more than happy to assist you. Alternately, you can view our education page here or view our education brochure here.