Using simulated annealing to solve the classroom assignment problem

The classroom (or hotel rooms, final exams, etc.) assigning problem consists of assigning a set of school classes that meet at different time, to a set of classroom. Any two classes will not be able to meet at the same time in an specific classroom. At the same time, it will not be able to assign any class to two different classrooms. Thousands of universities, highschools, and elementary schools all around the world have this problem every school term, Also, since the number of classes grows faster than the number of classroom, the problem becomes more diffult evey begining of a school term. In our particular case for the ITESM, Campus Monterrey, the problem is a very large and difficult one due to the number of classes (more than 2,500) and the number of available classrooms (182). This article shows the application of the simulated annealing technique to solve this problem at ITESM with the possibility to apply it to solve other similar problems at other universities or schools in general.