About Corpus
Corpus is an archive, not a syllabus. It exists so the durable parts of the computer science capstone — how to scope a topic, write a caption that works, defend your own research in conversation — outlive any one semester or instructor.
Origins
Why this archive exists, and how it grew out of Mike Heroux's retirement from teaching the computer science capstone.
The Lifetime Assignment
Thirteen enduring habits from the computer science capstone — the philosophy underneath every skill, workflow, and page in this Corpus.
Philosophy
The thinking behind splitting the archive into timeless Human Skills and timely, tool-dependent material.
A Tale of Three Students
A short skit — Null, Einar, and Dux — dramatizing what following (or skipping) these habits actually looks like over a semester.
Knowledge Half-Life
The rationale for why some skills are timeless and others need periodic refresh.
ReVeaL: Habits of Ongoing Learning
The habits the course tried to instill for continuing to learn after graduation.
Dialogue and Community
Why dialogue, not writing alone, is the deepest form of communication this course teaches.
Self-Assessment
How students were expected to test their own depth of understanding.
AI as Collaborator
The course's stance on generative AI tools and authorship.