In 2017 the ACM (the world's largest educational and scientific computing society), with the Joint Task Force on Cybersecurity Education, published Cybersecurity Curricula 2017 (CSEC2017), guidelines for baccalaureate programs in Cybersecurity.

The ACM CCECC (Committee for Computing Education in Community Colleges) is developing curriculum guidelines for associate degree programs, based on CSEC2017, with expected publication in early 2020. These guidelines, code-named Cyber2yr, map to the CAE knowledge units for two-year programs.

The global cybersecurity crisis has challenged academic institutions to build and grow cybersecurity programs to help produce a skilled and knowledgeable cyber workforce. The current state of cybersecurity education is faced with three intersectional challenges: 1) a dire shortage of faculty and teachers, 2) a rapidly evolving field, and 3) limited access to quality curricular materials. While addressing the shortage of faculty requires a long-term solution, it has been shown that high-quality curricula not only helps institutions build programs, but also improve student learning outcomes.

To meet the ever-growing demand for well-trained, ethically responsible cybersecurity professionals, we looked to programs and students at community colleges in the Dallas-Fort Worth area as input for our new degree in cybersecurity. Then we applied curricular guidelines from CAE, NICE, ABET, and ACM to develop high quality, academically challenging, and career-enriching ABET-accredited pathways for community college students to a degree in cybersecurity that is responsive to industry trends, changing standards, and employer needs.

The lack of soft skills such as communication, diversity, leadership, and work ethics being taught in programs reduces the effectiveness of cybersecurity experts as organizations across all industry sectors become targets of increasingly complex and debilitating attacks. We propose a program to improve the career-readiness of future workforce by increasing soft skill competencies, encouraging engagement through experiential learning, and providing opportunities for learning and networking through professional development using mixed reality tools and other novel activities.

This presentation will cover international opportunities for cybersecurity faculty to expand their technical and cultural vision of the discipline. Its purpose is to share experiences gained and to entice other academic or professional experts in cybersecurity to conduct research, pursue professional development, assist in curriculum development, and/or assess cyber best practices at international institutions through the Fulbright program.

In 2018, NSF awarded a group of community colleges funding to establish a standalone CyberCorps®: Scholarship for Service program. These community colleges received funding for student scholarships, tuition, and related costs. The session will briefly review the recruiting and selection process, the different curriculum pathways and describe the target audience to receive these scholarships. The fastpitch will also discuss how the institutions have collaborated to establish a cohort of students across multiple institutions.

In this talk, we will present the Society of Women in Cybersecurity (SWiCS), a less than one-year-old club. SWiCS is energized and ran by CSUSB students of The Jack H. Brown College of Business. The main aim of the club is to attract women to the technical field and especially to cybersecurity. SWiCS is a community of students (all genders) supporting each other through every step of their career, from school duties to job hunting. The aim of the club is to supplement classroom curricula through study groups, workshops, mentoring, networking, and internship/job placement assistance.

It is clear that in order to address the cybersecurity education and workforce crisis, the challenges are not just numerous but also inextricably linked. The least of which include a greater number of prepared faculty, effective curriculum, and infrastructure to host, use, and disseminate the curriculum. There is a demonstrated need for a cybersecurity digital library (DL) that will help address these challenges.

The purpose of this research is to glean insight into the taxonomy or differentiation methods used in cybersecurity employment. In addition, the research will identify the career paths have experienced professionals such as executives and senior managers taken to reach their current positions. Considering both top-down and bottom-up approaches, we can better identify what current KSAs and cybersecurity certifications are predominantly obtained by current cybersecurity professionals and what types of KSA are missing.

The University of Arizona, to enhance the learning experience of online, hybrid, and face-to-face students in the Cyber Operations degree program, has designed, built, and implemented a Cyber Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). Built upon a hybrid cloud architecture, students can log in to their classes from anywhere there is internet access, and safely complete hands-on learning exercises in a synthesized environment with no fear of damaging or interfering with current, live, computer networks.