Volunteer High School Teacher Advisor – Laptops in school anti-distraction system

We’re looking for a practising high school teacher to help us design Focus Bear’s new Classroom Mode system. Classroom Mode is aimed at reducing distraction from laptops in school.
The ProblemStudents increasingly need laptops in class. Unfortunately, the same laptop that gives them access to Google Classroom, research materials and assignments also gives them access to games, YouTube, social media and everything else on the internet.
Most schools already block obvious distractions at the network level. But students are often pretty good at getting around those controls. They can hotspot from their phones, use VPNs or proxy sites, switch to apps that aren’t blocked, or simply find the next distracting website that IT hasn’t added to the blacklist yet.
That creates an arms race that schools are unlikely to win.
Our PlanFocus Bear already helps individuals manage digital distractions across Mac, Windows, iOS and Android. With Classroom Mode, we want to explore giving teachers the ability to define what apps and websites are relevant for the current class. For example, in a maths class, self paced Maths websites like Mathspace or Mathletics would be allowed and everything else blocked. Students would be invited to join the focus session - if they accept, they can only access those sites. It works even if they use a hotspot or VPN.
Your roleIf we build something teachers find useful but students hate, we’ve failed.
We need a teacher advisor to help us understand what would actually work in a real classroom.
You’d help us think through questions like:When should a teacher be able to restrict distracting apps or websites?How can it work without teachers constantly configuring settings?How do we stop it becoming another piece of software students immediately try to defeat?How do we design it without pissing students off?What should happen if a student doesn’t want to join a Classroom Mode session?When should students be able to override a restriction, and what should the teacher see?What legitimate exceptions come up during real lessons?How should it work for neurodivergent students or students with individual learning needs?What would make teachers love this versus immediately switch it off?Where is the line between helping students focus and overly controlling their devices?What privacy, safeguarding or school-policy issues are we missing?
LogisticsThis is a volunteer advisory role. It would involve having meetings with our product team to provide input and reviewing concepts or prototypes as we develop them.
Time commitment: 1hr per fortnight.
You might be a good fit if you:Currently teach, or have recently taught, in a secondary school.Regularly teach students using laptops or other devices.Have strong opinions about technology in classrooms.Understand the ingenious ways students get around school IT restrictions.Are interested in student attention, wellbeing, neurodiversity or digital learning.Enjoy telling software developers when an idea will never survive contact with a Year 9 classroom.
In return, you’ll have a direct influence on a product being designed for schools and an early look at what we’re building.