Following two years of advocacy for increased condom accessibility, Princeton Students for Reproductive Justice (PSRJ) celebrated the launch of condom dispensers around campus with a party in Campus Club on Friday, April 19. The event capped off PSRJ’s second annual “Sex Ed week,” a week of events for advocacy and education on safe-sex practices.
The deployment of condom dispensers around campus represents the culmination of two years of effort by the the Contraceptive Access Committee, a PSRJ ad hoc committee. The first manifestations of their work began last May with a pilot program featuring 12 condom dispensers, 3D printed in collaboration with StudioLab. A little less than a year later, PSRJ was able to roll out 58 dispensers to upperclassmen dorms, graduate college residences, and Quadrangle, Tower, and the Cap and Gown eating clubs.
All dispenser locations are accessible via a virtual map, which also includes locations where contraceptives may be found that are not affiliated with PSRJ. These include residential colleges and McCosh Health Center.
Funding for the condom dispensers was provided by a TigerWell grant, a University program that grants funding to members of the campus community to support activities, programs, projects that “promote well-being at Princeton.” Condom companies have also provided condoms to PSRJ which are distributed with assistance from Campus Facilities workers, who stock and maintain the dispensers.
“I think a lot of what the PSRJ does is to help fill in the gaps for things that the University doesn’t provide for students,” said PSRJ co-president Charlotte Pfenning ’26. While the University does provide condoms through Residential College Advisers (RCAs) and McCosh Health Center, RCAs are only in underclassmen dorms, and McCosh only offers free access to condoms during business hours.
PSRJ’s efforts to fill this gap have come with obstacles. As PSRJ co-president Sam Yamashita ’26 told The Daily Princetonian, “There’s still a lot of stigma and shame related to sexual health.”
Yamashita said, “One of the myths that is pervasive and can sometimes be an obstacle to our work is that if you provide things like condoms or Plan B, it’s going to encourage people to engage in more sexualized behavior, which is not actually the case.”
“Sex Ed Week” serves as an opportunity for the PSRJ to advocate and inform the student body about safe sex practices that highlight the role of consent and protection. Activities included a Jeopardy-style game in collaboration with the Peer Health Advisors, promoting education on human papillomavirus (HPV), and lectures by postdoctoral researcher Katie Donnelly on intrauterine devices (IUDs) and Dr. Jessica Kahn ’86 on HPV. The celebration at Campus Club concluding programming included contraceptive distribution, live music, “vagina cupcakes,” and a specialty drink, “Consent is Sex-Tea.”
Students who attended the Condom Celebration highlighted their enthusiasm for the event, as well as their increased awareness of PSRJ’s initiatives.
Kristin Nagy ’27 told the ‘Prince,’ “I was really excited because I saw that they were going to have vagina cupcakes.” She also noted that “all of [PSRJ’s] sex ed events have been really great and educational,” making her “excited about all the new initiatives they're doing on campus.”
Nagy has been a guest contributor to The Prospect.
Soncera Ball ’25, who was invited to perform for the celebration, shared with the ‘Prince’ her appreciation for the resources that PSRJ provides to students. “It’s really important to have a place to go for that sort of thing because a lot of people don't know who to ask or to talk to or where to go for resources,” she said.
While condom dispensers are PSRJ’s most recent effort, they continue to provide for students in other ways. This includes an emergency contraceptives hotline, where students can anonymously request Plan B to be delivered by one of their volunteers to any on-campus location between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. for free.
Yamashita focused on the resilience of their efforts. “Both the EC [Emergency Contraceptives] hotline and the condom dispensers, those are things that we have a lot of people who are really passionate about,” she said. “They’re not going anywhere.”
Vitus Larrieu is a contributing News writer and head Podcast editor for the ‘Prince.’
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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