NSF INCLUDES Planning Grant: Building Cybersecurity Inclusive Pathways towards Higher Education and Research (CIPHER)

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This NSF INCLUDES planning grant is funded by NSF Inclusion across the Nation of Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science (NSF INCLUDES), a comprehensive national initiative to enhance U.S. leadership in discoveries and innovations by focusing on diversity, inclusion and broadening participation in STEM at scale. The goal of this planning grant is to address cybersecurity education and training in K-16.As cyber threats continue to grow in sophistication, no organization or individual is immune to cyberattacks. On one hand, there is a widening skills gap. Unfilled cybersecurity jobs are expected to reach 1.8 million by 2022, as reported by the Center for Cyber Safety and Education. On the other hand, the cybersecurity education and training institutions in the nation have found it difficult to keep pace with the growing demand for cyber talent. There exists a significant gap between K-12 and college education in cybersecurity. Moreover, it is deeply challenging to achieve diversity and inclusion given the highly technical and interdisciplinary nature of cybersecurity. Lack of partnership and coordination between education institutions further leads to gaps in the nation’s current cybersecurity education landscape. The project aims to pave the way for a national alliance for building Cybersecurity Inclusive Pathways towards Higher Education and Research (CIPHER), that will focus on a researcher-practitioner partnership for the development of fundamental, theoretically-grounded, and systematic approaches to inclusive K-16 cybersecurity education, especially for students with low socioeconomic status (SES). This project will directly benefit at least 10 school districts (with a total of 175,163 students) and a dozen colleges and universities. In the long term, it will provide essential support to inclusive cybersecurity workforce development, mitigating the massive workforce shortage and leading to long-lasting positive impacts on the national economy and social diversity. The project includes a series of planning activities to engage a full spectrum of stakeholders and prepare the groundwork for establishing CIPHER. Scholars from multiple disciplines and practitioners from multiple fields will work together to fully understand the problems and explore the design space. It will lead to fundamental findings about what administrators, educators, counselors, and parents need to know and be able to do to support cybersecurity education. The outcomes include the establishment of a CIPHER researcher-practitioner partnership that engages all stakeholders, deep understanding about the current knowledge and infrastructure gap, and creation of an inclusive model for K-16 cybersecurity education, which can be replicated national-wide for bringing cybersecurity education to all students. The project will develop a range of effective ways including online resources to engage underrepresented or underserved communities. This endeavor will lead to broader and profound impacts, reshaping the landscape of K-16 cybersecurity education in the nation.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.