For a student who has autism spectrum disorder, going to school and being included with their peers can require special accommodations to help them learn.
While most teachers work with parents to meet these students' needs, one mom was shocked to discover her son's desk had been moved to a school bathroom.
Teachers and educators are better equipped to teach children on the spectrum and can customize lessons to suit their learning styles.
These students can become overstimulated by bright lights or loud noises, and might need a quiet workspace to learn and concentrate.
Danielle Goodwin shared a shocking photo of her 11-year-old son, Lucas, and his teacher's solution to provide him with a quiet workspace.
So, Danielle discussed creating a quiet workspace with his teachers and it seemed like everyone was on the same page. However, the teacher's solution was hardly what Danielle had in mind.
"Yes, that is my son's desk over a toilet. She also provided a camping mat and pillow for him to nap....on the bathroom floor," Danielle said in a Facebook post that accompanied the photo of Lucas standing next to his desk in the bathroom.
Lucas' teacher assured Danielle that the bathroom was sanitary to use as a workspace because the school doesn't "use it as a bathroom" anymore and it was being used as a storage room.
She took Lucas home and said the incident caused him so much anxiety that he began vomiting.
In an official statement, the school district's Superintendent Greg Baker confirmed that Lucas' teacher had repurposed the bathroom into a workspace due to financial and spatial restrictions in the school.
"This current situation is an example of staff trying to seek a solution to temporarily repurpose a room. To our knowledge, the room had been used as storage, not as an active restroom," he said in a statement to Yahoo!.
Lucas has not returned to school since the incident happened on September 16 and Danielle plans on keeping him home until they can find a better solution.
Her post has racked up thousands of comments on Facebook, with many parents agreeing with her that placing Lucas' desk in the bathroom was undignified.
This mom revealed that her daughter has her own "office," which is really just an unused room in the school, to work in.
This Facebook user who also needs a quiet room to concentrate called the school's bathroom solution "insulting" and "revolting."
This Facebook user who has autism shared his inspirational story and encouraged Lucas to work past this stressful situation.
