Producing the commercials

For two Wednesdays, the pupils have been working on their marketing campaigns. For the majority, the pitches were accepted (see previous blog installlment), however, a couple of groups had to start from scratch.
As always with roleplaying, unforeseen situations have cropped up. In one particular case, two agencies decided that in order to win the competition for best economy, they would let the employees work for free.
This is actually what gamers would call an exploit - a misinterpretation of the game mechanics. However, we decided to deal with the situation diegetically; that is to say, inside the fiction.
Two teachers were dressed up as union people, and went to visit the agencies. They wanted to make sure that no-one was doing anything that was in conflict with their rules and regulations. When they heard that some of the employees were working for free, they threatened with law suits.
The agencies immediately reverted to paying their employees. My impression was that the pupils enjoyed that there was a response to their actions - in fact, pupils almost always enjoy interactivity, and being able to influence the storyline. It gives them a feeling of ownership.
Another thing that made the pupils positive towards this way of dealing with the lack of pay was that the two teachers who played the union people were heavily disguised. The kids found the masquerade completely hilarious, and they crowded around the perpetraitors to see what was going on.

Another event (which we had anticipated) was when one girl decided to quit her job. She was one of the few pupils who had been negative about the game right from the start (however, her attitude towards school in general is very negative). The rest of the group she was in were taking the game very seriously, and she decided she'd had enough.
However, a representative from the job centre immediately swept in and put her on income support. Obviously she had to prove that she was looking for a new job. When she didn't, she was put into trainging (course work in Maths). Shortly after that she had herself reinstated in her prevous job, but only after promising the agency to do better this time.