The difference

Stop scheduling on a yellow legal pad.

Every fall, principals lose weekends to grids on whiteboards and color-coded post-its. Master Scheduler does the first draft for you so you can spend the time deciding, not drawing.

Without it

Six hours of erasing.

Yellow legal pad & a sharpie
Specialist double-booked — nobody notices until Tuesday
Grade-team common prep keeps slipping
One change → redraw the whole grid

With Master Scheduler

Click. Draft. Print.

First-draft rotation in < 15 minutes
Conflicts flagged in plain English with a fix
Common preps locked per grade, every day
One adjustment → regenerate, done

What it does

Four things, done properly.

Not a feature buffet. Master Scheduler does the parts of building a rotation that take the longest, and gets out of your way for the rest.

01 · Specials rotation

Art, music, PE, library — rotated so nobody's in two rooms at once.

The scheduler reserves each specialist's (day, period) slot before placing the next one. If one pattern can't fit every grade, it auto-adds a second pattern and tries again.

Specialist double-bookings flagged before they bite
Honors per-special grade eligibility (e.g., library only K–3)
Block specific periods if a specialist isn't there that day
Manual cell locks survive regenerate

02 · Common prep periods

Each grade gets the same prep, every day. Locked.

Grade-team common preps are the foundation of a workable rotation. The wizard places them first, protected from being overwritten by a wandering specialist. If you turn on Automate prep periods, the engine shuffles valid layouts — same draft on every Generate, reproducible.

One protected common-prep period per grade, daily
Automate or pick by hand — either survives regenerate
Variation index lets you cycle through valid options
Manual mode is byte-for-byte deterministic (no surprises)

03 · Lunch placement

Lunch periods placed, with teacher and student conflicts flagged.

Pick which periods are teacher lunch and which are student lunch in your bell schedule. The wizard auto-places each teacher's lunch in a free allowed period and flags any conflict in plain English. Per-period start / end / recess overrides are one slider away.

Teacher lunch + student lunch periods on the bell schedule
Auto-assigned teacher lunch with conflict flagging
Per-period start / end / recess overrides
Honest scope: lunch is placed and checked, not solved against capacity

04 · Plain-English conflict fixes

Every flag comes with a sentence you can read out loud.

No cryptic solver output. When something can't be placed, you see exactly which grade, which period, why — and a suggested fix you can apply with one click. Service-configuration warnings (e.g., pull-out scheduled during a protected block) show up the same way.

One conflict, one explanation, one suggested fix
Service-config warnings for push-in / pull-out (ENL, Speech, OT, AIS)
Surfaces before you publish — not after staff sees it
Unplaceable cells stay unplaced — never silently forced into a double-book

How it works

From blank slate to printable rotation — in four steps.

Set up your school day

Periods, bell or cycle, and how many teaching days are in your rotation. Bell-or-cycle lives behind a tidy disclosure so you don't see it unless you need it.

Add grades & specials

Your grade bands (K–8 + an optional Early Childhood track) and the specials you run. Each grade's common prep is set here — automate it or pick by hand.

Set lunch periods

Mark which periods are teacher lunch and which are student lunch. The wizard auto-places each teacher's lunch in a free allowed period — conflicts are flagged.

Generate & print

One click. Prep schedule, by-class view, cluster cards, EC track and a print packet appear. Conflicts come with plain-English fixes. Export CSV or print.

Why this exists

Built by a teacher who's sat in those scheduling meetings.

Hi — I'm Mr. B. I teach K–8 full-time. Every September I'd watch my building's leadership team lose a weekend to a whiteboard. Master Scheduler started as my own spreadsheet, then a small app, then this. Every feature has a story behind it from a real planning meeting.

It's not a venture-backed enterprise platform. There's no sales team, no SDR, no “contact us for pricing.” $49.99/year for the whole school. If something doesn't fit your building, email me and I'll fix it — that email goes to me, not a queue.

— Mr. B, Big Brain Labs

Admin questions

Things principals actually ask.

How does Master Scheduler handle protected blocks like Fundations?

You define grade-level instructional blocks (Reading, Writing, Fundations, etc.) in Setup → Grade Blocks, mark Fundations as Protected core, and any pull-out service that would land on it gets flagged in the Services audit. The block-aware view is read-only against the generator in v1 — the engine doesn't pull from protected blocks because it doesn't schedule student services yet; it flags them so you can.

What about pull-out services like ENL, Speech, OT, AIS?

You define services and their allowed blocks per grade (e.g., ENL push-in for ELA, AIS pull-out from Flexible only). The Services tab shows a per-grade audit matrix, flags missing rules, and warns on pull-out from protected blocks. v1 is a planning & audit surface — not a session scheduler. We're transparent about that; the empty state on the Services tab says so.

Where is my data stored?

On your device, in browser localStorage. Nothing is uploaded; we don't run a server for your schedule data. Save / Load JSON gives you full export and import — bring it to another browser, hand it to your AP, archive it. For privacy reviewers, our calm one-page district & compliance handout covers FERPA, COPPA, and NY Ed Law 2-d.

Can I export to CSV or print packets?

Yes. Print / Export tab prints a full packet (prep schedule, class view, cluster cards, EC, conflicts, services audit) with proper page breaks — portrait or landscape per view, automatically. CSV exports: one file per view (Prep Schedule, Class Schedule, Cluster Cards, Early Childhood, Conflicts, Grade Blocks, Services, Allowed Blocks). Open them in Google Sheets via File → Import.

Does it work for K–5? K–6? K–8?

Built around K–8, but you choose which grades exist for your building — the engine works the same for K–5, K–6, or K–8. The capture wizard on Step 1 lets you mark your grade span and school model; that informs copy but does not branch the generator. 3K / Pre-K runs as a separate Early Childhood track with its own coverage.

What if my building doesn't fit any of this?

Email me. Big Brain Labs is one teacher answering one inbox — not a support queue. If something doesn't fit your building, we figure it out. The promise here is honesty about scope: Master Scheduler builds specials & common-prep rotations well; it doesn't claim to be a bell-by-bell whole-school master schedule, because it isn't one. Yet.

Can I try it before paying?

Yes — Master Scheduler has a 14-day free trial. You can build a full draft, see the conflict explainer, and print a packet without paying. The $49.99/year school license applies only if you decide to keep it.

One price. Whole school.

No per-seat math. No quotes. No PO maze. A single yearly license for the whole building — priced to expense on one line.

⭐ For schools

$49.99

per year

Master Scheduler — annual school license

Full Master Scheduler — no class, grade, or specialist limits
Specials rotation, common preps, lunch placement, conflict explainer
Services tab (push-in / pull-out audit) & Early Childhood track
Print packets & CSV exports for every view
Schedule data stays on your device — no server, no uploads
Email support from a working K–8 teacher
Annual license · whole school · renews yearly

Get Master Scheduler — $49.99/yr → Start a free 14-day trial

One $49.99/year license covers your whole school. Buying for a district? Email us for a PO or quote.
Privacy reviewers: see the district & compliance handout.

Your specials rotation,
before your coffee's cold.