diff --git a/backend/app/Controllers/CurriculumController.php b/backend/app/Controllers/CurriculumController.php
index 398ed4b..d5dad77 100644
--- a/backend/app/Controllers/CurriculumController.php
+++ b/backend/app/Controllers/CurriculumController.php
@@ -66,26 +66,16 @@ class CurriculumController
             flush();
         }
 
-        // Run worker natively in the same PHP process (in the background from client's perspective)
+        // Run worker completely in the background via CLI
         try {
-            // Capture all output to log file
-            ini_set('display_errors', 1);
-            error_reporting(E_ALL);
-            ob_start();
+            $cmd = "php " . escapeshellarg($scriptPath) . " " . escapeshellarg($taskId) . " > /dev/null 2>&1 &";
+            exec($cmd);
             
-            // CRITICAL: Set $GLOBALS['argv'] so the required worker script can access $argv[1]
-            // (In a web request, $argv is empty — we must set it globally before requiring the worker)
-            $GLOBALS['argv'] = ['curriculum_worker.php', $taskId];
-            $_SERVER['argv'] = $GLOBALS['argv'];
-            
-            require $scriptPath;
-            
-            $output = ob_get_clean();
-            file_put_contents($logPath, $output, FILE_APPEND);
+            // Log that we spawned it
+            file_put_contents($logPath, "[System] Spawning background worker: $cmd\n", FILE_APPEND);
         } catch (\Exception $e) {
-            $err = "[Exception] " . $e->getMessage() . " in " . $e->getFile() . ":" . $e->getLine();
-            file_put_contents($logPath, $err . "
-", FILE_APPEND);
+            $err = "[Exception] " . $e->getMessage();
+            file_put_contents($logPath, $err . "\n", FILE_APPEND);
             
             // Update state file to error
             $stateFile = $processingDir . '/' . $taskId . '.json';