mlsanityData to 14 Oct 2026

Schedule-and-Calibrate: Utility-Guided Multi-Task Reinforcement Learning for Code LLMs

arXiv 2605.06111 ↗First posted 7 May 2026cs.SE cs.AIcited by 0

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Abstract (arXiv)

Reinforcement learning (RL) with verifiable rewards has proven effective at post-training LLMs for coding, yet deploying separate task-specific specialists incurs costs that scale with the number of tasks, motivating a unified multi-task RL (MTRL) approach. However, existing MTRL methods treat all coding tasks uniformly, relying on fixed data curricula under a shared optimization strategy, ultimately limiting the effectiveness of multi-task training. To address these limitations, we propose ASTOR, a multi-tASk code reinforcement learning framework via uTility-driven coORdination. Centered on task utility, a signal capturing each task learning potential and cross-task synergy, ASTOR comprises two coupled modules: 1) Hierarchical Utility-Routed Data Scheduling module hierarchically allocates training budget and prioritizes informative prompts, steering training toward the most valuable data and 2) Adaptive Utility-Calibrated Policy Optimization module dynamically scales per-task KL regularization, matching update constraints to each tasks current training state. Experiments on two widely-used LLMs across four representative coding tasks demonstrate that ASTOR consistently improves a single model across all tasks, outperforming the best task-specific specialist by 9.0%-9.5% and surpassing the strongest MTRL baseline by 7.5%-12.8%.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026). Builds on 24 of its 36 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 7 May 2026.

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References · 24

  1. 2024DeepSeekMath: Pushing the Limits of Mathematical Reasoning in Open Language Modelscited by 9,379
  2. 2025Qwen3 Technical Reportcited by 8,820
  3. 2025DeepSeek-R1: Incentivizing Reasoning Capability in LLMs via Reinforcement Learningcited by 6,330
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  10. 2021Conflict-Averse Gradient Descent for Multi-task Learningcited by 459
  11. 2024CRUXEval: A Benchmark for Code Reasoning, Understanding and Executioncited by 300
  12. 2017Distral: Robust Multitask Reinforcement Learningcited by 233
12 more
  1. 2020Just Pick a Sign: Optimizing Deep Multitask Models with Gradient Sign Dropoutcited by 201
  2. 2024RLEF: Grounding Code LLMs in Execution Feedback with Reinforcement Learningcited by 151
  3. 2020Multi-Task Reinforcement Learning with Soft Modularizationcited by 143
  4. 2025LeetCodeDataset: A Temporal Dataset for Robust Evaluation and Efficient Training of Code LLMscited by 70
  5. 2025Unlocking Efficient Long-to-Short LLM Reasoning with Model Mergingcited by 58
  6. 2025CodeRL+: Improving Code Generation via Reinforcement with Execution Semantics Alignmentcited by 24
  7. 2024The Current Challenges of Software Engineering in the Era of Large Language Modelscited by 21
  8. 2025Imbalanced Gradients in RL Post-Training of Multi-Task LLMscited by 20
  9. 2025Software Development Life Cycle Perspective: A Survey of Benchmarks for Code Large Language Models and Agentscited by 11
  10. 2025Learning to Generate Unit Test via Adversarial Reinforcement Learningcited by 11
  11. 2024Automated Commit Message Generation with Large Language Models: An Empirical Study and Beyondcited by 10
  12. 2025MindSpeed RL: Distributed Dataflow for Scalable and Efficient RL Training on Ascend NPU Clustercited by 9

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