Capitol College’s recent re-designation as a Center of Academic Excellent in Information Assurance was bolstered at the 13th Colloquium for Information Systems Security Education conference in Seattle, Washington by a student research team that presented on the issue of information assurance education.
Vice President for Academic Affairs and Chief Academic Officer Dr. W. Vic Maconachy led a team of two Capitol students, Peter Starland and Department of Defense Information Assurance Scholarship Program scholarship recipient Jennifer Duryea, who discussed the need to develop a common understanding of a curriculum which prepares students to practice in the field of information assurance.
“The research revealed that, within academia, information assurance education is not consistently approached. Significant to the problem is a failure to come to an agreement on definitions within the discipline and to define a standard curriculum,” said Maconachy. “Despite a ten-year push by government for colleges and universities to produce increasing numbers of information assurance professionals, there remains insufficient evidence that this call to action has produced the desired results.”
The team found no well-defined plan of action and suggested that success of the goal of increasing the pool of information assurance professionals requires that a plan be developed and shared with those engaged in the process. They proposed a national summit to address information assurance education at the graduate and undergraduate level.
NSA projects to fill approximately 1300 positions each year for the next few years, actively recruiting from CAE institutions like Capitol to fill critical information assurance jobs that students like Starland and Duryea will find themselves being recruited for. Students attending designated CAEs are eligible to apply for rare scholarships and grants through the Department of Defense Information Assurance Scholarship Program and the Federal Cyber Service Scholarship for Service Program.