How to apply
You must apply as a team of 2 or 3. There is no individual admission. Every member submits their own form and names the others. There is only one round.
Apply here: application form. Every member of your team submits it separately. It closes Thursday September 10 at 11:59pm.
Before you start, read the course page. This class requires roughly 10 hours a week outside class, your product must be live and used by someone outside the class by week 7, and you report a metric publicly every week.
No team yet? Use the teammate thread on the course discussion board. Post what you build, what problem you care about, and a link to something you have shipped, then go talk to people. Finding teammates is your job, not the instructor's.
How enrollment works
Join the waitlist for section 021 in Vergil when you submit the form. Enrollment is managed from that waitlist. Admitted teams are let in before the change of program deadline on Friday September 18.
Being on the waitlist is not an application and does not get you a seat. The form is the application. If your team is not admitted you will be removed from the waitlist, so do not sit on it hoping to be let in later. There is no rolling admission and no second round.
Dates
Fall 2026 runs on a compressed timeline, because the term begins before a full application round can finish. Week 1 is therefore an open session that anyone may attend, and admitted students register during the change-of-program window.
| Date | What happens |
|---|---|
| Now | Applications open. Discussion board is open for finding teammates. Join the Vergil waitlist for section 021. |
| Tue Sep 8 | Week 1 session, 10:10am, 602 Northwest Corner. Open to anyone, admitted or not. Come see the format before you commit to it. |
| Thu Sep 10, 11:59pm | Applications close. One deadline. It does not move. |
| Fri Sep 11 to Mon Sep 14 | Interviews, 10 minutes per team, scheduled by the instructor. |
| Mon Sep 14 | Admits go out and admitted teams are let in off the waitlist, four days before the change of program deadline on Fri Sep 18, which is the last day to add a class. |
| Tue Sep 15 | Week 2. First full session with the admitted cohort. Weekly updates begin. |
The interview
Ten minutes, the same four questions for every team, conducted and scored by the instructor against a rubric fixed before any application is read. Every team member speaks. Shipping evidence and evidence of customer contact are weighted heaviest. Credentials and GPA are not considered.
The questions
The form asks the following. Read them now so you are not writing your answers at midnight on the deadline.
1. You
- 1.1 Name, UNI, program, and expected graduation.
- 1.2 Link to something you have built. A live URL or a repo. Required.
- 1.3 In one sentence: what is it, and who used it besides you?
- 1.4 What do you personally do? Frontend, backend, ML and models, infra and deploy, design, talking to users and selling, other.
2. Your team
- 2.1 Your team code. Pick a short code together, lowercase and no spaces, and make sure every member types it identically. It is how your applications are matched into a team. If your codes do not match, you are not a team.
- 2.2 How many people are on your team, including you? 2 or 3.
- 2.3 Your teammates' names and UNIs. Required. Give UNIs, not just names, in case two people with the same name apply. A person who does not submit their own application by the deadline is not on your team. Someone who has said they are interested, or who plans to decide later, does not count. Do not list them.
- 2.4 How do you know each other, and what have you built or worked on together? If you met on the discussion board, say so and describe what you have done together since. This is the highest-signal question on the form. A team that shipped a hackathon project together in March is a very different bet than a team that formed last Tuesday to meet a requirement. Answer honestly. "We met in a class group project and it went well" is a fine answer. A vague one is not.
Teams are admitted whole or not at all. If you apply as a team of three, all three of you are admitted or none of you are. We do not split teams and we do not admit two of you. Choose your teammates accordingly, because their application is now your application.
3. The problem
- 3.1 What problem do you want to work on, and who would you sell the solution to? One paragraph. Be specific about the person, not the market.
- 3.2 Have you talked to anyone who actually has this problem? Who are they, and what did they tell you? If you have not talked to anyone yet, say so, that is an honest answer.
- 3.3 Name one person with this problem you could reach within two weeks of the term starting.
4. Commitment
Read this section carefully. Roughly a third of the seats in a course like this are wasted by people who enroll, shop around for two weeks, and drop, which leaves their teammates with a hole they cannot fill.
- 4.1 Do you have a conflict with the Tuesday 10:10am to 12:00pm meeting time?
- 4.2 What else are you taking this term, and realistically how many hours a week can you give this course?
- 4.3 If you are admitted, will you enroll and stay enrolled
through the end of the term?
Yes means yes. Not "probably," not "unless something better comes up." This course is built on teams of two or three, and a person who leaves in week 2 costs two other people their semester, so a seat is only useful in the hands of someone who intends to keep it. If something outside your control could affect your term, that is a different matter: answer yes and explain it in 5.1. - 4.4 Type your full name to confirm three things: you have read the time commitment, your answer to 4.3 is truthful, and every teammate you listed in 2.3 has read the same commitment and given the same answer.
5. Anything else
- 5.1 Is there anything else I should know? Visa timing, a required course that may conflict, a job decision pending, anything that affects your term. Optional, and it does not count against you.
Applications and interview notes are read by the instructor and the teaching staff. By submitting, you consent to that.