GatorPath

An MCP server that helps SF State students plan their degree with any AI assistant. It answers "what's left?", "what's my 4-year path?", and "which classes for cybersecurity, and in what order?" Every answer is checked against the official Bulletin.

The AI suggests, the code verifies.

Status: v0.1.0 (2026-10-30), phase 7 (evals, first users). Design: docs/ARCHITECTURE.md. Work: TASKS.md. Changes: releases.

Why

SFSU's Degree Planner and DPR show what's required, but not which direction to take or why. Ask a chatbot instead and it answers from memory: renumbered courses (CSC 210 is now CSC 215), prerequisites that don't exist, a graduation term nobody checked. GatorPath gives the assistant tools that read the 2026-27 Bulletin, the major's roadmaps and SFSU class-search history, and a check_plan that every plan has to pass. Each rule cites its source: a Bulletin page, or the SF State office page it came from.

Related MCP server: Academic Advisor MCP Server

Setup (macOS)

You need gatorpath.zip, which includes the course catalog: download it from the latest release (the repo is private: ask the maintainer for access). Then:

brew install uv poppler
unzip gatorpath.zip -d ~ && uv --directory ~/gatorpath sync
claude mcp add --scope user gatorpath -- uv --directory ~/gatorpath run gatorpath

The last line is for Claude Code. It asks before each GatorPath tool runs; to approve them all once, type /permissions in Claude Code and add the allow rule mcp__gatorpath__*. For Codex CLI it's codex mcp add gatorpath -- uv --directory ~/gatorpath run gatorpath. For Claude Desktop, open Settings → Developer → Edit Config, add this, and restart the app:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "gatorpath": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["--directory", "/Users/YOU/gatorpath", "run", "gatorpath"]
    }
  }
}

If Desktop says it can't find uv, put the full path from which uv in "command".

From source (no zip): clone the repo, put the Bulletin PDF at data/raw/bulletin-2026-27.pdf, and build the catalog with the ingest commands in AGENTS.md.

Use

Start with the Plan my degree prompt (Claude Code: /mcp__gatorpath__plan_my_degree). It asks once for what it needs. The fastest way in is your DPR: in Student Center, print the Degree Progress Report to a PDF and give the assistant the file's path (don't attach it). GatorPath reads it on your machine and drops your name and ID.

In a client without MCP prompts (Codex CLI), just ask, and mention SF State, e.g. "I'm an SF State CS major, plan the rest of my degree": the tools hand it the same steps. Without "SF State" a client may answer from web search, and nothing checks that plan.

Evals

47 questions (evals/questions.yaml) on synthetic students across the three catalog years, Winter Session included, run through Claude Code and Codex CLI with only the gatorpath server attached (run 2026-10-29, full report in evals/REPORT.md). Each client starts the way its students do: Claude Code from the Plan my degree prompt, Codex CLI (no MCP prompts) from the student's words alone.

Misses in that run: goal fit for the same game-development student on both clients (SF State's two game courses rarely run and ranked past the first 25 electives, so neither plan had them); Codex presented a plan with open slots for a student retaking CSC 215 without running check_plan; Claude left one student's math placement out of the profile. Codex's plans took a median 22 tool calls, down from 68 on 2026-10-21 (TASKS.md, "Done 2026-10-29": efficiency and token usage).

Fixed on 2026-10-30: the electives list names the options past its first 25, and GE suggestions are checked at each requirement's own term in the plan, not the plan's first. A rerun of the 15 plan questions: both clients 15/15 passed, plans 15/15, goal fit 14/14, a plan in the first reply 15/15. After that, GE suggestions come from courses that ran in the last year, each with when it ran; on the four plan questions this touches, every plan passed check_plan with goal fit, and none picked a course that hadn't run lately.

Limitations

• Hand-written rules: BS Computer Science and BS Applied Mathematics for three catalog years, 2024-25 (the old GE Areas A-F), 2025-26 and 2026-27. Requirements follow the student's catalog year; courses and prereqs are the newest Bulletin's. A DPR on a catalog year without rules is planned with 2026-27 rules plus a warning, and the DPR wins where they disagree. import_dpr recognizes a Computer Science or Psychology DPR; for other majors (no sample to read the program line from yet), type the courses or use the transcript instead.

• 106 other bachelor's programs for 2026-27, plus BA Psychology for 2025-26 (list_programs marks them drafted: true), are AI-drafted from the Bulletin's text, then checked by program: every course code, page and word-for-word quote, the unit totals, and a test plan that passes check_plan. Each had a first-pass review against its Bulletin text (Claude, 2026-10-23; docs/review-2026-27-drafts.md); a person hasn't signed them off yet, so they stay verified: false. Rules the format can't express (a CR/NC unit cap, a course taken four times, a GPA floor) show as unparsed with the Bulletin's words: GatorPath doesn't check them, and a degree with one is never marked complete. 2 of the Bulletin's 110 aren't served: BA Philosophy and Religion (suspended, nothing printed) and BA Family and Community Sciences (no roadmap).

• BS Applied Mathematics: the three application electives are "chosen with the consent of the applied mathematics advisor" (p.2129), so GatorPath can't list them; it counts only the ones you say were approved.

• Only the 2025-26 BS CS rules are signed off by a person (verified: true). The others are verified: false: for BS CS 2026-27, eight rounds of independent AI review against the PDF brought the error rate from 19.6% to 10.6%, each finding fixed. BS Applied Mathematics hasn't had a review yet.

• Offering history (2023-spring to 2027-spring) covers CSC, MATH, PHYS, PSY and SXS; 89 other subjects have only the Spring 2027 schedule, so "not offered" there means one term, and GE suggestions favor courses on it (a fall-only course there reads as not run lately); the rest show offered: unknown.

• The transcript importer hasn't seen a real CR / W / I / repeat row yet, and the DPR's transfer-row Notes codes have no legend. Both get flagged rather than guessed.

• Tested on macOS only.

• Course codes, grades and units go to your AI provider as tool results; your name and ID don't. GatorPath stores nothing unless you ask the assistant to save_profile.

Prior art

Earlier projects for SF State students: GatorWay (MIT; transcript to interest-based electives over MCP) and Plan-Ed (SF Hacks × GDG 2026, 2nd place; a four-year plan from Gemini and a rules engine, as a web app). How GatorPath differs: ARCHITECTURE §3.

Scope

• v1: SF State, BS Computer Science (2026-27 Bulletin), then BS Applied Mathematics (2026-27, rules unverified), then the other bachelor's programs (2026-27, AI-drafted, unverified)

• Later: transfer credit, week-level schedules, web UI

Not affiliated with San Francisco State University. Always confirm with your advisor and your official Degree Progress Report.

MIT License: see LICENSE.