Goal
The Cyber Education Project (hereafter referred to as CEP) is an initiative supported by a diverse group of computing professionals representing academic institutions and professional societies to develop undergraduate curriculum guidelines and a case for accreditation for educational programs in the “Cyber Sciences.” Organized in July 2014, CEP is currently leveraging a community of interest to inform and drive the work forward.
What are the “Cyber Sciences?”
The term “Cyber Sciences” reflects a collection of computing-based disciplines involving technology, people, and processes aligned in a way to enable “assured operations” in the presence of risks and adversaries. It involves the creation, operation, analysis, and testing of secure computer systems (including network and communication systems) as well as the study of how to employ operations, reasonable risk taking, and risk mitigations. The concept of “Cyber Sciences” refers to a broad collection of such programs, and disciplines under this umbrella often also include aspects of law, policy, human factors, ethics, risk management, and other topics directly related to the success of the activities and operations dependent on such systems, many times in the context of an adversary.
How do the “Cyber Sciences” differ from cyber security, information assurance, cyber operations, digital forensics, computer and network security, and many other such related fields?
The “Cyber Sciences” are not a single discipline, any more than the health sciences are a single discipline within the broad field of health related fields. The “Cyber Sciences” represent a range of related computing-based disciplines involving many possible subspecialties like (for example) cyber security, computer and network security, cyber operations, digital forensics, and many more. But each of these represent only one subpart of the larger “umbrella” of cyber related fields that we are calling the “Cyber Sciences.”
What is the process that CEP is following to meet its goals?
There are four subcommittees supporting the CEP project: the Stakeholder Committee, the Learning Outcomes Committee, the Accreditation Committee and the Industry Advisory Board. These four groups are working in parallel with the following goals:
- The goal of the Stakeholder Committee (SC) is to bring together a diverse group of constituencies from academia, government, professional societies, and industry to participate in the CEP discussions. The SC will also develop venues to communicate ongoing work and end results of the project (e.g. via websites and conferences) to interested groups.
- The goal of the Learning Outcomes Committee (LOC) is to engage interested stakeholders (leveraging the work of the SC) in the development of learning outcomes which characterize the knowledge, skills, and abilities that should be gained by students in an undergraduate program in one of the Cyber Sciences. The committee will build upon previous works, which have defined related bodies of knowledge, and seek diverse perspectives to build an interdisciplinary set of learning outcomes that broadly define undergraduate education in the Cyber Sciences. The primary objective of this effort is to provide the cyber education community with useful guidance on developing curricula for the Cyber Sciences. The outcomes developed will also be used to guide the development of criteria for program accreditation in one or more Cyber Science disciplines.
- The goal of the Accreditation Committee (AC) is to develop draft ABET undergraduate Program Criteria for disciplines within the Cyber Sciences umbrella based on (1) results from the Learning Outcomes Committee, (2) existing related bodies of knowledge/curriculum maps (including drafts of such works), (3) existing curricula, (4) existing ABET Criteria, and (5) input from interested stakeholders.
- The goal of the Industry Advisory Board (IAB) is to provide input to the CEP project from industry stakeholders in the cyber arena. This input will involve providing feedback on project artifacts and deliverables, as well as overall leadership for the project.
Organizational Structure
Cyber Education Project Steering Committee
Andrew Phillips, Chair
United States Naval Academy
[email protected]
Chris Inglis, Chief of Staff
United States Naval Academy
[email protected]
Allen Parrish, Communications Director
The University of Alabama
[email protected]
Cyber Education Project Learning Outcomes Committee
David Gibson, Co-chair
U.S. Air Force Academy
[email protected]
Elizabeth Hawthorne, Co-chair
Union County College
[email protected]
Cyber Education Project Accreditation Committee
Raymond Greenlaw, Co-chair
U.S. Naval Academy
[email protected]
Steven Lingafelt, Co-chair
Organization: IEEE CEAA
Employer: IBM
[email protected]
Cyber Education Project Stakeholder Committee
Sue Fitzgerald, Co-chair
Metropolitan State University
[email protected]
Diana Burley, Co-Chair
George Washington University
[email protected]
Cyber Education Project Industry Advisory Board
Scott Buck, Chair
Intel Corporation
[email protected]