EP13 - Classroom seating app and the Ryanairing of School

Episode: The Classroom Seat Exchange

You are stuck between two chatty kids in class again. The teacher moves kids around constantly, but doing so takes ages. So Amanda came up with an AI app that could optimise classroom seating using kids' feedback, teacher priorities, and learning needs. Sounds brilliant, right?

Then Mark had an idea: What if kids could buy and sell their seats?

Front row near the whiteboard? £50 a term. Guaranteed quiet neighbor? £30. Window seat? £20. And if you don't want your premium spot anymore, sell it to the highest bidder. Now 10-year-olds are learning about supply, demand, and market economics.

Is this a smart solution to a genuine classroom problem, or have we just invented educational capitalism?

Join Amanda and Mark as they debate whether an AI seating optimiser is brilliant operational thinking, and whether adding a marketplace makes it completely bonkers, or uncomfortably honest about how education already works.

Topics: AI in education, classroom management, market economics, inequality, EdTech, teaching innovation