# Sample Compression for Self Certified Continual Learning

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.10503 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10503/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 49 of its 84 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 13 Mar 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 49)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [An Image is Worth 16x16 Words: Transformers for Image Recognition at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.11929/) (2020)
- [Emerging Properties in Self-Supervised Vision Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.14294/) (2021)
- [Overcoming catastrophic forgetting in neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.00796/) (2016)
- [Fashion-MNIST: a Novel Image Dataset for Benchmarking Machine Learning Algorithms](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1708.07747/) (2017)
- [Learning without Forgetting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.09282/) (2016)
- [iCaRL: Incremental Classifier and Representation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1611.07725/) (2016)
- [Gradient Episodic Memory for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.08840/) (2017)
- [Progressive Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.04671/) (2016)
- [Continual Learning with Deep Generative Replay](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.08690/) (2017)
- [Memory Aware Synapses: Learning what (not) to forget](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.09601/) (2017)
- [Experience Replay for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1811.11682/) (2018)
- [Efficient Lifelong Learning with A-GEM](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.00420/) (2018)
- [Learning to Prompt for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.08654/) (2021)
- [Dark Experience for General Continual Learning: a Strong, Simple Baseline](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.07211/) (2020)
- [PackNet: Adding Multiple Tasks to a Single Network by Iterative Pruning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.05769/) (2017)
- [A Comprehensive Survey of Continual Learning: Theory, Method and Application](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.00487/) (2023)
- [An Empirical Investigation of Catastrophic Forgetting in Gradient-Based Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1312.6211/) (2013)
- [Online Continual Learning with Maximally Interfered Retrieval](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.04742/) (2019)
- [Expert Gate: Lifelong Learning with a Network of Experts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1611.06194/) (2016)
- [Orthogonal Gradient Descent for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.07104/) (2019)
- [Coresets via Bilevel Optimization for Continual Learning and Streaming](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.03875/) (2020)
- [Revisiting Class-Incremental Learning with Pre-Trained Models: Generalizability and Adaptivity are All You Need](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.07338/) (2023)
- [A Unified Continual Learning Framework with General Parameter-Efficient Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.10070/) (2023)
- [Avalanche: an End-to-End Library for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.00405/) (2021)
- [Online Coreset Selection for Rehearsal-based Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.01085/) (2021)
- [Expandable Subspace Ensemble for Pre-Trained Model-Based Class-Incremental Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.12030/) (2024)
- [Tighter risk certificates for neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2007.12911/) (2020)
- [A Theoretical Analysis of Catastrophic Forgetting through the NTK Overlap Matrix](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.04003/) (2020)
- [How catastrophic can catastrophic forgetting be in linear regression?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.09588/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [Bound to Disagree: Generalization Bounds via Certifiable Surrogates](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.23128/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Continual learning algorithms aim to learn from a sequence of tasks. In order to avoid catastrophic forgetting, most existing approaches rely on heuristics and do not provide computable learning guarantees. In this paper, we introduce Continual Pick-to-Learn (CoP2L), a method grounded in sample compression theory that retains representative samples for each task in a principled and efficient way. This allows us to derive non-vacuous, numerically computable upper bounds on the generalization loss of the learned predictors after each task. We evaluate CoP2L on standard continual learning benchmarks under Class-Incremental and Task-Incremental settings, showing that it effectively mitigates catastrophic forgetting. It turns out that CoP2L is empirically competitive with baseline methods while certifying predictor reliability in continual learning with a non-vacuous bound.
