Aunt Flo's heroes

Members of The Period Project (TPP) are philanthropists and advocates, providing menstrual products to those in need and initiating dialogue about menstrual health.

Moved to act after encountering a peer unable to afford menstrual products, Maddie Sloat, BSC ’19, founded the student organization in 2016. Since then, TPP members have donated countless products to a local homeless shelter, school districts, and assistance programs, and worked to establish permanent Student Senate funding to stock products in Athens campus restrooms.

“I had never realized [access to menstrual products] was something that people are concerned about and something that is really impacted by poverty—because we don’t really talk about it at all,” Sloat says.

TPP’s efforts spread far beyond the bricks of Athens, and its mission extends far beyond providing pads and tampons, also incorporating activism and education.

Members have advocated to end the luxury tax on menstrual products and have facilitated conversations and information sessions designed to end the stigma associated with menstruation and educate women and men on menstrual health.

Inspired and, in some cases, guided by TPP, branches of the organization have sprouted up everywhere from the University of Akron to India.

“[The Period Project] has allowed me to have conversations with people literally all over the world,” says TPP President Karinne Hill, BA ’19. “It’s really encouraging that people from all over the world are aligning with this mission and wanting to bring the same kind of thing to their area.”

Feature illustration by Louisa Cannell