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academic-delivery

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8-step pipeline for academic deliverables — essays, reports, analysis, capstones. Encodes the full intake-to-delivery workflow with automatic red-team triggering.

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Source SKILL.md: https://github.com/winstonkoh87/Athena-Public/blob/HEAD/examples/skills/workflow/academic-delivery/SKILL.md

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Academic Delivery Skill

Purpose: Structured pipeline for academic/knowledge deliverables. Prevents the V1-is-weak failure mode by auto-triggering adversarial review. Origin: Extracted from real-world execution of client assignments. Every assignment manually reconstructed this pipeline — now it's codified.

The 8-Step Pipeline

Step 1: INTAKE

  • Parse brief/requirements document
  • Extract: word count, format (essay/report/problem set), rubric criteria, deadline, client name
  • Identify prescribed frameworks or sources (e.g., "use Hirshfield as critical lens")
  • Log to .context/client_work/pricing_log.md if commercial

Step 2: SCOPE

  • Classify deliverable type:
    • Essay (argumentative, comparative, reflective)
    • Report (technical, research, capstone)
    • Problem Set (calculations, code, SPSS)
    • Presentation (slides, pitch deck)
  • Estimate complexity (Λ score)
  • If commercial: trigger client-pricing skill for quote generation

Step 3: RESEARCH

  • Load domain context via Exocortex (smart_search.py)
  • If external research needed: trigger deep-research-loop (Cluster #12)
  • Extract key frameworks, models, citations
  • Build a reference spine (3–7 sources minimum for essays)

Step 4: DRAFT (V1)

  • Write full first draft to spec
  • Embed citations inline
  • Target 90–95% of word count (leave room for red-team additions)
  • DO NOT deliver V1. V1 is always a working draft, never the output.

Step 5: RED-TEAM (Mandatory — Auto-Triggered)

[!IMPORTANT] This step is non-negotiable. It fires automatically after Step 4. Shipping V1 with zero counter-readings and zero formal analysis is the canonical failure mode.

  • Feed V1 through adversarial review (Cluster #8 — red-team-review)
  • Evaluate against:
    1. Counter-reading: Does the draft contain at least one steelmanned opposing interpretation + rebuttal? (~80 words, non-negotiable)
    2. Formal analysis: For literary/theoretical work — does it engage with the form (enjambment, structure, methodology), not just content?
    3. Evidence density: Every claim backed by textual evidence or citation?
    4. Rubric alignment: Does the draft hit every criterion in the brief?
    5. Genre compliance: Is the output in the correct academic register? (MLA vs APA vs report format)
  • Generate a fix list with accept/reject decisions for each criticism
  • Reject invalid criticisms (category errors, phantom rubric scoring, n=1 methodology applied to literary analysis)

Step 6: REVISE (V2+)

  • Incorporate accepted fixes from red-team
  • If >3 structural issues found, produce V3 (rare — V2 is usually sufficient)
  • Re-check word count against target
  • Verify counter-reading and formal analysis are present

Step 7: COMPILE

  • Format per submission requirements:
    • Cover page (if required)
    • Table of Contents (forces a structural audit — per Session 06 learning)
    • Section headers (topic-based, not numbered, for MLA essays)
    • Works Cited / References (MLA, APA, or Harvard as specified)
    • Appendices (if applicable)
  • Compaction triage: If over word count, cut from infrastructure (setup/transition/repetition) first, analytical core last. Ratio: 70% infrastructure cuts, 30% analysis cuts.
  • Paragraphing pass — wall-of-text paragraphs are a delivery failure, not a content failure.

Step 8: DELIVER

  • Final proofread (grammar, citation format, page numbers)
  • Export to required format (Markdown → Google Doc → DOCX)
  • If commercial: send to client with scope confirmation
  • Log completion to activeContext / quicksave

Exit Gate

No deliverable leaves Step 8 without:

  • Counter-reading present (if argumentative/analytical)
  • Formal analysis present (if literary/theoretical)
  • Word count within ±5% of target
  • All rubric criteria addressed
  • Format compliant (citations, headers, cover page)

Reflexion Archive

[REFLEXION] What failed: V1 shipped with zero counter-readings and zero formal analysis. Why: Over-optimised for clean thesis confirmation. Lesson: Auto-trigger red-team after V1. 80 words for a counter-reading is non-negotiable.

[REFLEXION] What failed: A capstone delivered at $83/hr effective rate (73% rate collapse vs benchmark). Why: No pricing skill fired during intake. Lesson: Step 2 (SCOPE) must trigger pricing evaluation for commercial work.