Required Placements

Required placements let you lock a specific student into a specific classroom before running the placement generator. The algorithm treats required placements as fixed — it will never move them — and builds the rest of the classroom lists around them.

What Are Required Placements?

A required placement is a binding instruction that says "this student must be placed in this classroom." Unlike preferences or restrictions, which guide the algorithm's decisions, a required placement removes the decision entirely — the student's classroom is already determined.

When to Use Required Placements

Required placements are useful in situations where a student's classroom placement is non-negotiable:

Specialized programs — A classroom offers a specific curriculum track (e.g., gifted program, bilingual instruction) and certain students must be enrolled in it.
Parental requests — A parent has formally requested a particular teacher or classroom, and the school has agreed.
Additional support needs — A student requires a specific classroom environment, aide, or teacher trained to support their needs.
Administrative decisions — School leadership has decided certain students should be in a given classroom for scheduling, logistical, or policy reasons.
Returning students — A student who changed classrooms mid-year needs to be placed back into the same classroom for continuity.

How to Add a Required Placement

To create a required placement, add students and classrooms first. If either prerequisite is missing, the Required Placements page shows the next setup action instead of an empty form:

Navigate to the Required Placements tab on your placement workspace.
Select the student you need to lock from the dropdown.
Choose the target classroom from the Classroom dropdown.
Click Add Required Placement to save it.

Each student can only have one required placement. If you change your mind, delete the existing required placement and create a new one.

How Required Placements Affect the Algorithm

When you generate a placement, the algorithm:

Places every student with a required placement into their designated classroom first.
Treats those placements as immovable — they cannot be changed during optimization.
Distributes the remaining students around the fixed placements, optimizing for balance, preferences, and restrictions.

Because required placements are locked in, they affect the balance calculations. For example, if you lock five boys into the same classroom, the algorithm has fewer options to achieve even boy/girl distribution across all classrooms.

Tips for Required Placements

Don't over-constrain. The more students you lock, the less flexibility the algorithm has to create balanced classes. Use required placements only when there is a clear reason.
Let the algorithm do the balancing. If your goal is balanced classrooms, trust the algorithm with as many students as possible. Lock only the exceptions.
Check for conflicts.Make sure required placements don't contradict restrictions. If Student A is restricted from Student B but both students are required to be in the same classroom, the algorithm cannot produce a valid result.
Review before generating. Double-check your required placements list before generating a placement. It is easier to adjust beforehand than to re-run the algorithm.