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(CNN) - A school district in the state of Washington, United States, faces criticism for putting an autistic student's desk in a bathroom after his mother said he needed a "quiet place" to do his job better.
Danielle Goodwin told KOMO, a CNN affiliate network, that she had discussed the special needs of her 11-year-old son with her teacher. But when they showed up at Whatcom Middle School in Bellingham, Washington, this week, they found their desk in a bathroom, Goodwin said.
"I was surprised," he told the station on Thursday. "I was so surprised that I took the picture because I didn't believe what I was seeing."
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Goodwin did not respond to CNN's request for comments on Saturday, but she shared the photo on Facebook, showing her son's desk over the toilet and her chair next to the bathroom sink.
She asked him if he could work in the library and they said no, Goodwin said in the Facebook post. They also told him that "it was good that he was there" because the school did not use the space as a bathroom.
His son also has an autoimmune disorder, Goodwin told KOMO, highlighting why the suggestion that he work in a bathroom was problematic.
Danielle Goodwin shared this photo of her son's desk in a school bathroom.
"My son was humiliated, ashamed and disgusted by this inhuman suggestion that he work in a bathroom," he said.
In a statement posted online, Bellingham Public School Superintendent Greg Baker said: "We knew the place had been used as a warehouse, not as an active toilet."
The idea of putting Goodwin's son there was "an example of the staff trying to find a solution to temporarily reuse a room," Baker said.
No student spent part of their school day in the bathroom, he said.
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Due to limited state funding, "schools often have limited space to meet the educational and socio-emotional needs of students," he added.
As an example, Baker noted that the district has previously converted classrooms for temporary staff and the principal's office into meeting spaces to provide enough space for the full-time kindergarten.
"Again, my preliminary assessment is that this idea was well intentioned, but in the end we did not progress with it," he said.
Artemis Moshtaghian of CNN contributed to this report.
AutismEducation in the United StatesWashington