The college will use the grant funding to attract and retain students from communities that are typically underrepresented in cybersecurity education.
Bluegrass Community and Technical College has received a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation in the amount of $650,000 called “Securing the Future Workforce: Inclusive Cybersecurity Technician Education for All.” The grant will give Bluegrass Community and Technical College the resources to encourage female students and students from diverse backgrounds to pursue an education in cybersecurity. Additionally, the school has been redesignated as a Center for Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense (CAE-CD) through the year 2028, solidifying it as the only school in the KCTCS system to have earned the designation.
According to an article on Bluegrass Community and Technical College’s website, Dr. Greg Feeney, who serves as the president and CEO of the school, was quoted as saying of the grant and the opportunities it will open up, “Receiving this grant will enable BCTC to provide essential support for both recruiting students interested in STEM fields and meeting the needs of our community partners. We are committed to collaborating with our regional technical workforce stakeholders to expand access to a larger and more diverse cybersecurity workforce in central Kentucky, helping to address local demand. BCTC is the only KCTCS college with the CAE-CD designation, stressing our commitment to educating the cyber workforce.”
Bluegrass Community and Technical College has identified several steps it will take to help diversify the pool of qualified and educated cybersecurity professionals in the Kentucky workforce, which has remained generally homogenous up until this point. The idea of the initiative is to diversify the talent pool by creating a pipeline that begins in local middle schools and high schools and brings interested students to Bluegrass Community and Technical College to complete their cybersecurity education and enter the workforce with the necessary skills to become successful in the field.
One of the steps the school plans to take is to implement an outreach program that gives mentorship and guidance to female and other underrepresented students in five local schools, with the aim of attracting them to cybersecurity. The grant will also allow Bluegrass Community and Technical College to recruit 20 middle school and high school teachers and counselors in these local schools to gain a better understanding of cybersecurity so they themselves can identify students who have an interest in the field and can guide them toward pursuing a cybersecurity education. The college will also hire a recruitment and retention specialist and will create a near-peer mentoring program to match new cybersecurity students with more experienced ones to help them with their studies.
For more information about Bluegrass Community and Technical College, visit the school’s website.