Semester 10: Capstone: Rubric and Passing Standards
The World-Class Strand evidence is non-compensatory: every required category must pass even when the rest of the submission is strong.
This rubric applies to the semester-level checkpoint, exam, and project. Use it with the answer key and solution outlines to keep grading consistent and learner-visible.
Minimum Passing Standard
To pass Semester 10: Capstone, the learner must satisfy all of the following:
- Checkpoint: at least 80% of checkpoint prompts are answered correctly and independently, with no critical gaps in degree-level synthesis through an end-to-end system, defense, operations evidence, and professional judgment.
- Exam: overall score is at least 70%, and no major section that tests a core semester outcome is below 60%.
- Project: all required deliverables are present, the artifact can be inspected or reproduced by another person, and the learner can defend the main tradeoffs.
- Human-impact evidence: the required usability/accessibility report and ethical impact decision record both meet their completion criteria; neither can be compensated for by a stronger technical score.
- Integrity: sources, collaboration, generated assistance, and borrowed code or examples are acknowledged.
- Remediation: any conditional pass includes a written repair plan and evidence that the highest-risk gap was revisited.
Failure in any one of these categories means the semester should not be marked complete yet, even if the other artifacts look strong.
Grading Rubric
| Dimension | Needs repair | Minimum pass | Strong pass | Excellent / portfolio-ready |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Concept command | Uses terms loosely or confuses core ideas. | Defines and applies the required concepts with minor gaps. | Explains concepts through examples, counterexamples, and constraints. | Teaches the ideas clearly and connects them across semesters. |
| Reasoning quality | Jumps to answers; hides assumptions. | Shows enough steps to inspect correctness. | Makes assumptions, invariants, and tradeoffs explicit. | Compares alternatives and anticipates edge cases or objections. |
| Evidence | Claims are unsupported or impossible to reproduce. | Provides basic proofs, tests, diagrams, traces, or outputs. | Evidence targets the riskiest claims and is easy to verify. | Evidence is organized as a review packet a third party can audit. |
| Semester integration | Treats modules as unrelated topics. | Connects the main semester themes to the assessment. | Synthesizes multiple modules in one coherent explanation or artifact. | Shows how mastery of degree-level synthesis through an end-to-end system, defense, operations evidence, and professional judgment shapes engineering judgment beyond the course examples. |
| Usability and accessibility | Makes an unsupported claim that the interface is usable or accessible. | Shows a task-based test, one evidence-driven revision, and applicable WCAG 2.2 checks. | Retests the revision and combines manual, automated, keyboard, semantic, focus, reflow, and contrast evidence appropriately. | Produces an auditable inclusive-design report, explains limitations, and connects findings to durable component or product decisions. |
| Ethical accountability | Lists generic principles without analyzing the actual decision. | Differentiates stakeholders, benefits, harms, evidence, uncertainty, and at least one viable alternative. | Connects safeguards to harms and assigns owners plus observable remediation triggers. | Survives adversarial review, states the strongest objection fairly, and shows how post-launch evidence can reverse or revise the decision. |
| Communication | Hard to follow; missing context. | Understandable and complete enough to grade. | Clear structure, named decisions, and concise explanations. | Professional presentation with honest limitations and next steps. |
Strong Submission Traits
Strong submissions usually demonstrate these traits:
- concise explanations that reveal the mental model, not just the final answer
- concrete artifacts that can be run, checked, reviewed, or traced
- explicit handling of edge cases, constraints, and failure modes
- visible revision: mistakes were found, corrected, and documented
- appropriate connections between degree-level synthesis through an end-to-end system, defense, operations evidence, and professional judgment and prior semester foundations
Common Weak Submission Patterns
Watch for these patterns during self-review:
- vocabulary recognition without the ability to apply the idea to a new prompt
- impressive-looking diagrams, code, or prose with no verification evidence
- hidden dependencies on tutorials, solution videos, or AI-generated answers
- project scope that is too broad to inspect or too narrow to prove the required skill
- missing reflection about tradeoffs, limitations, or what would be done differently
Calibration Decision Guide
- Pass: all minimum standards are met and weak patterns are minor.
- Conditional pass: the artifact is mostly sound, but one bounded repair is required before moving to graduation.
- Repeat / revisit: a core concept, core deliverable, or integrity requirement is missing.
When uncertain, grade against evidence rather than effort. Time spent is useful context, but the semester is complete only when the learner can demonstrate the outcomes.
Reconciled evidence and workload contract
Use the workload and progression contract: 530–785 author-estimated hours, all CA/CT/CD/OR/GD module categories and G1–G7 required, plus original exam/checkpoint/project/integrity rules. A pending runtime or reviewer requirement is not a pass. Module assessment pages and strand calibration distinguish evidence from proposals; no single architecture is prescribed. Retain failed attempts, repairs and a fresh transfer exercise after at least 48 hours.
Foundation transfer at graduation
Use the foundation transfer audit within the existing G7 defense and project-assembly budgets. It connects earlier required evidence to fresh capstone changes without extra hours or forced AI/parallel features. All original runtime and independent-review gates remain.