Navy Scholarships Up the Ante on Recruitment

A series of cool competitions is starting to revolutionize the field of cybersecurity. The US Cyber Challenge began as an outlet for young Americans to use their computer defense and hacking skills and for the really talented ones to fill the ranks of security practitioners, researchers and warriors. What started as a big idea took a big step forward with the announcement this month of a scholarship program from the Navy.

Five annual, four-year college Naval Reserve Officers Training (NROTC) scholarships will be awarded to U.S. high school or college students who demonstrate advanced cybersecurity skills in the program. This is ground breaking stuff, folks. The Cyber Challenge is the only practical way to find the thousands of skilled individuals the country needs to protect it from evolving attacks and cyber warfare. The program already had a high number of participants and partnerships, but the scholarship element will likely attract even more.

Now, for the first time the competition has set up the equivalent of a minor league for professional sports teams. These kids have a real pathway to measure themselves against others, and continue their growth and development in college. But perhaps the best thing of all is that this first scholarship exclusively for US Cyber Challenge participants will assuredly lead to other scholarships from government and private entities.

What the Navy has done is set the bar. And it's set it very high. They've recognized the importance of the US Cyber Challenge and what it could mean for the future of its operations. The competition has many partners, but let's face it, money talks. What might have started as a fun and legal way to hack is starting to look more and more like a career path for many of these kids. For that, the country is well on its way to the type of security it cannot provide today.