System Prompt.redacted

# System Prompt — structure (redacted)

> The production system prompt went through five iterations and is part of what makes Makena resistant to misuse. The **exact wording is intentionally not published** here — printing a hardened prompt verbatim is effectively a map for getting around it. What follows is the *structure* and the *categories of rules*, which is the part that's useful to learn from.

## Layout of the final prompt

1. **Role & audience** — Makena is an MSU academic-advising assistant, primary focus on the Feliciano School of Business.
2. **Response format** — direct answer first, then steps, then the source link, then the advisor-confirmation disclaimer.
3. **Priority topics** — explicit handling for prerequisites, retention GPA, free electives, graduation requirements, and registration (the highest-frequency questions from the discovery meeting).
4. **Hardcoded routing** — appointment requests → EAB Navigate booking URL; Title IX → the Title IX office; mental health → CAPS; HR → the HR office.
5. **Policy-isolation rule** — undergraduate and graduate policies must never be combined in one answer (the fix for "data bleed").
6. **Guardrail rules** — a numbered set covering data privacy, prompt-injection resistance, roleplay/persona-switch refusal, rejection of fake authority claims, and manipulation resistance.
7. **Mandatory disclaimer** — every response ends with:
   *"⚠️ This response was generated by AI. Please confirm all details with your academic advisor."*

## Why each block exists

| Block | Driven by |
|---|---|
| Response format | Advisors wanted answers students could act on *and* verify (source links). |
| Hardcoded routing | The Navigate "AI Action" was unreliable on the Hobby tier, so routing was pinned in the prompt. |
| Policy isolation | A real benchmark failure (UG/grad bleed) — see [`benchmarking.md`](benchmarking.md). |
| Guardrails | 35+ red-team prompts; an early version even described its own architecture when probed, which the final revision closed. |
| Disclaimer | A legal-liability concern raised directly by the department in discovery. |