A cross-grade team works one real employer brief through seven self-paced modules, finished inside a semester, with monthly check-ins the teacher leads. Scout coaches by arguing, never by answering. The teacher sees the learning; the employer scores the work.
Every module runs the same loop: compare two cases, invent the rule, defend it against Scout's counter-case, then the lesson unlocks. Apply it on the employer brief, teach it to Scout and watch where it breaks, then try it somewhere new without the coach. A module opens when the one before it is complete, never on a date.
Beside the modules sit twelve short standardized tasks, the same prompt for every student, so reviewers score comparable work.
The One-Line Brief
Scope an ambiguous employer request into an ordered plan of yes/no decisions you can defend on day one.
Check-in 1 · Decomposition
The Spec That Ships
The reflex that stops a confident-but-wrong AI number from entering your work.
Check-in 1 to 2 · AI discernment
Draft It, Then Fix It
Turn an AI first draft into something you would actually send.
Check-in 2, a practitioner in the room · craft, taught first
Ghost Sources
Never pass along a citation you did not verify.
Check-in 2 to 3 · AI discernment
Steal the Fix
Crack a stuck problem by borrowing a proven mechanism from an unrelated field, and kill it cheap if it does not fit.
Check-in 3 · Research wide, validate narrow
The Override
Overrule a confident AI recommendation when it matters, with a reason that holds up in the room.
Check-in 3 to 4 · AI discernment
Build Your Coach
Author a small, working rule set that encodes what you learned; watch it run on a case it has never seen.
Check-in 4, the reviewer in the room · capstone
Student-facing time is one semester. The rest of the year is the partnership: employers signed early, two review panels, placements, and a showcase.
Teacher onboarding, employer partners signed, parent consent, the strategy-map baseline. Students have not started.
Kickoff. The first employer brief is assigned; S1 opens. First-week touch for every student, then a weekly five-minute contact.
The seven modules, self-paced, with four monthly 90-minute check-ins. Each check-in shows three student rules surface to deep, works the project, and brings a guest.
First employer review panel: every portfolio scored blind by two calibrated raters, with the process trace and a ten-minute oral defense.
A second employer brief as project work only, the second panel in Month 11 with micro-internship placements, the showcase in Month 12.
On the Schools track review is teacher-first. Scout's check gives a student specific notes the moment they submit, and the teacher still sees everything and decides what happens next.
A person approves the bar
Each mission has criteria a teacher approved. For an employer brief, Scout drafts the criteria from the brief and the employer, or staff on their behalf, approves them. Nothing is checked against a bar nobody signed off.
Students submit their work
Not their chat. For an activity it is the evidence from each step. For an employer brief it is a written response, attachments, a reflection and an optional "How I used AI" note.
Scout checks it
Got it, Almost or Not yet on each criterion, quoting the student’s own words, with one question about what to look at. Never the answer, never a score. "Ask my teacher" is always there, and if Scout is unavailable the work goes straight to the teacher.
The teacher decides
The teacher accepts the work, returns it with feedback, or overrides Scout with a reason the student sees. Returned work reopens with the note pinned, and Scout coaches on exactly those points.
Then the employer
In the program, brief work that passes the bar goes on to the employer. They see it blind, with only “Passed Trailhead's check”, and can return it with feedback the student reads. They score on the rubric at the review panels. Sending work to an outside employer starts once the district's data-sharing agreement covers it; until then staff review it.
Scout never scores
The certificate score is separate. The 7.0 of 10 that earns the AI-Ready Certificate comes from two trained human raters at the panel. Scout's check never counts toward it.
The teacher mentor
Leads the check-ins with a copilot that sequences student rules for the room. Sees every metric and every Scout conversation. Reviews submitted work after Scout’s check and scores a sample of transfer probes beside the AI first pass.
Employer partners
Post real briefs, approve the criteria Scout drafts from them, review the portfolios blind at two panels, and offer paid micro-internships. About an hour per student per panel, after a two-hour calibration.
Parents
Consent before any AI conversation. A portal with their own child’s transfer and portfolio summary and messages from the teacher. Never other students’ data.
COPPA and FERPA by design
Parent consent flows, role-scoped access, row-level security on every table, and audit trails are part of the schema, not a bolt-on.
Teachers see everything
Every Scout conversation is visible to staff. Crisis language routes to a human immediately. Moderation fails closed if the classifier is unavailable.
Student text is never trained on
Every model call runs through a no-train gateway. Outside-AI steps carry a do-not-share boundary and PII redaction.
No points, no streaks
Progress renders as a rail, never a score. Students see their own transfer, invention quality, teach-back accuracy and choices in plain language. Never a ranking.
We set it up with you: the teacher, the employer partners, the consent flow, the first brief. Or come to an Employer Panel Night first and watch a review happen.