The University of Arizona's (UA) AZSecure SFS program seeks to further expand and develop training of service-motivated students to be critical public defenders of America's cyberspace. To support this, UA has obtained a designation by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) as a Center of Academic Excellence (CAE) in Cyber Defense (CAE-CD), Research (CAE-R), and Cyber Operations (CAE-CO), making UA one of the few public institutions with all three prestigious CAE designations. In 2018, UA was granted Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) status by the Department of Education, the first of Arizona's three state universities to receive this designation. Through targeted recruitment efforts, the program's goal is to increase the representation of women, underrepresented minorities, and active or veteran military members in cybersecurity fields. The program is deliberately multidisciplinary, integrating cybersecurity education and research across the campus. Due to the success of the university's SFS program and as direct evidence of program sustainability and institutionalization, the UA recently launched a multidisciplinary MS in Cybersecurity program. In addition, in 2018 UA developed a new industry-focused Scholarship-for-Industry (SFI) program with significant funding from the college and university. This project will help fuel a sustained, institutionalized cybersecurity education program that will have significant impacts on the state of Arizona and the nation.
The program consists of an innovative curriculum that combines coursework with hands-on experiential learning through research, teaming students with experienced faculty mentors to develop deeper expertise than coursework alone can provide. University of Arizona will continue to focus the current efforts on building a program for Arizona, and to capitalize on its many geographic strategic advantages. Arizona has a higher percentage of Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) and a greater number of military bases than many states. By leveraging its four-year colleges, working professionals with an undergraduate degree, and military veterans and reservists reentering civilian life, UA have a diverse and talented recruitment pool to draw from. The goal is for these groups to account for at least 50% of the university's qualified applicant pool and a commensurate part of accepted scholarship recipients. The proposed SFS program renewal fuses education and experiential learning through research to produce knowledgeable professionals in key and emerging cybersecurity domains, such as: cyber threat intelligence, large-scale vulnerability assessment, social engineering, and cybersecurity big data. Its innovative and cross-disciplinary curriculum includes dedicated coursework and significant research with world-class faculty mentors. The program will contribute to meaningful curriculum development, sustained institutionalization of critical cybersecurity education, and a well-trained workforce of cybersecurity professionals for the U.S. government.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
