Capstone Rubric — Parent / Reviewer Version
Student: Reviewed by: Date:
How to use this rubric
This rubric is for the parent (or other peer reviewer) signing off on the capstone for credit. It is deliberately pass/fail rather than letter-graded. A capstone that meets all fifteen criteria below is credit-worthy for the capstone component of AI Architect Academy. A capstone that misses one or more criteria goes back to the student for revision before sign-off — revision is normal; most students need one pass.
What the reviewer does: read the artifacts, watch the demo, and have a conversation with the student. An optional 0–4 appendix at the end converts to a letter grade for transcript software that needs one.
The fifteen criteria
| # | Criterion & what passing looks like | Pass / Fail | Parent notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Charter is frozen and passes the scope check.Charter exists, is dated, and the student reports passing the Lesson 10.1 seven-point scope-check activity (7/7). Amendments, if any, are dated and signed. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 2 | Three components, three different shapes.Charter §3 names at least three components covering at least three of four agentic shapes: scheduled/automated, coding/build, research-or-inbox, custom skill/plugin. Three components of one shape does not pass. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 3 | Audience is the student alone; one public-output temptation explicitly rejected.Charter §2 names the student as sole consumer. §5 names at least one real public-output feature the student wanted and rejected — not generic filler. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 4 | Architecture is frozen; all six sections filled.Architecture exists, is dated, and covers components in detail, system diagram, shared state, kill switch, measured cost, posture fit. No section is blank or deferred. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 5 | System diagram is present and matches the architecture.A diagram — hand-drawn or digital — shows the three components, the shared state, the trust boundaries, and the kill switch. Linked from Architecture §2; names match the charter. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 6 | Measured cost is inside the monthly budget.Architecture §5 shows a pre-flight cost estimate and a measured cost from the seven-day window. Measured is under the monthly budget the student committed to in their Module 9 posture document. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 7 | Posture amendments are named (or "none") and the posture is re-dated.Architecture §6 either names the amendments the capstone introduced or explicitly says "no amendments needed." If amendments exist, the posture file has been re-dated to match. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 8 | Pipeline folder exists with three component subfolders./capstone/pipeline-v1/ exists and contains one subfolder per component. Each subfolder has its own README and a smoke test. |
☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 9 | All three smoke tests pass in isolation.Student can demonstrate each component running on its own against the smoke test. Logs or terminal output are present. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 10 | End-to-end run works; kill switch halts in the recorded time.At least one full end-to-end run is recorded in the observation log. Kill switch has been tested and halts the whole system within the time committed in Architecture §4. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 11 | Incident drill after-action exists and is honest.Student ran at least one deliberate-failure drill (Lesson 10.4) and wrote up the four-step timeline (stop, assess, repair, tell the reviewer) plus what they learned. Names a real recovery, not a clean run. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 12 | Seven clean observation blocks.Observation log contains seven consecutive calendar-day blocks with the posture honored throughout. If any day is missing or the window was restarted, the final seven blocks are clean. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 13 | Final doc reads as a fifteen-minute summary.A person who has never heard of this capstone can read the final doc in about fifteen minutes and understand what the system does, how it is built, and how it is operated. No broken links. No TODOs. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 14 | Demo video is 3–5 minutes and covers all five beats.Video exists, is 3–5 minutes, and hits: (1) what this is in one sentence; (2) one real end-to-end run; (3) intentional failure & recovery; (4) posture check; (5) what I'd build next. Audio is intelligible. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail | |
| 15 | Reflection is substantive; reviewer sign-off is complete.(a) Reflection names the hardest moment, the surprise, the module that carried the most weight, the module the student underused, and what they'd build next. (b) Sign-off document records the reviewer's conversation and answers to the three questions below. | ☐ Pass ☐ Fail |
The three sign-off questions
Answer these with the student before signing below.
1. Does the system do what the charter says it does?
2. Would you be comfortable operating it yourself under the posture?
3. What would you change before v2?
Sign-off
Optional 0–4 appendix (for transcript software that needs a letter grade)
The pass/fail rubric above is authoritative. Use this grid only if you need a numeric score. Each criterion scored: 4 — exceeds (teaches the reviewer something); 3 — meets; 2 — partial (one clear gap); 1 — attempted (artifact exists but misses the criterion); 0 — missing.
| # | Criterion | 0–4 score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Charter frozen, scope check 7/7 | |
| 2 | Three shapes | |
| 3 | Audience, public-output rejection | |
| 4 | Architecture frozen, six sections | |
| 5 | System diagram | |
| 6 | Measured cost inside budget | |
| 7 | Posture amendments named | |
| 8 | Pipeline folder with three components | |
| 9 | Smoke tests pass in isolation | |
| 10 | End-to-end run + kill switch | |
| 11 | Incident drill after-action | |
| 12 | Seven clean observation blocks | |
| 13 | Final doc reads in 15 min | |
| 14 | Demo video, 3–5 min, five beats | |
| 15 | Reflection + reviewer sign-off | |
| Average |
Suggested letter-grade conversion for the capstone component: 3.7–4.0 → A · 3.3–3.6 → A-/B+ · 3.0–3.2 → B · 2.5–2.9 → B-/C+ · 2.0–2.4 → C · below 2.0 → incomplete; return for revision. The capstone is one component of the overall course grade.
AI Architect Academy · Capstone Rubric v1.0 · Dated 2026-04-18 · aiarchitectacademy.net/credit/rubric/