With 1 LED and the sensor HC-SR04:
if distance less than 10 cm led must be on.
Moving away from an object will begin to decrease the intensity of the brightness of the LED.
Moving forward from an object will begin to decrease the intensity of the brightness of the LED.
Unlike The Real World, "partnering" may be frowned upon.
(Sometimes I think I should make a "real world programming" class, where instead of having assignments like "create a simple program that does X", you do things like "Here's a complex program (with reasonable documentation.) Add a feature to do Y. Fix the bug Z. Get the program to compile using Keil instead of gcc. Figure out how to make it do the same thing while reducing RAM consumption by 10%. Change the Uno direct port manipulation to work on an Every. Actually, switch all that port manipulation to be fully portable using digitalWrite. Make it faster by finding a faster digitalWrite implementation for each of (a, b, c.) (Sigh.))
I do not know if you are serious here, or frustrated, but I CAN NOT AGREE MORE to this idea of earning credits (dare I say "privs"?) NOT to disqualify anyone, but to give them the tools and exercises for maximizing their use of this board/forum toward their own independent work.
Arduino.cc already have a CAI to get one or two badges, and it is not a click-through, rather, the correct answer must be attained before progressing.
Bottom line: GREAT IDEA.
[Edit] AND, no one gets grandmothered in. Everyone earns the badge, or does not post.[/edit]