The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded Whatcom Community College (WCC) in Bellingham, WA two cybersecurity grants totaling $1.28 million.
The $930,000 “Expansion of the CyberWatch West Resource Center” grant builds on funding awarded to WCC in 2018 to establish a national resource center in cybersecurity education. The national resource center leverages WCC’s leadership since 2013 of the regional CyberWatch West center, which recently changed its name to the National Cybersecurity Training & Education Center (NCyTE). This new grant will expand the center’s ability to support partner colleges and strengthen the nation’s workforce through faculty professional development, faculty and student mentoring, dissemination of evolving cybersecurity curriculum, industry partnerships, and virtual career fairs. Whatcom County benefits directly from these awards through exposing local faculty, students and industry to these resources and through the recognition they bring to the College from across the nation.
NSF also awarded WCC a $350,000 grant for NCyTE to organize and convene a national conference on the role of community colleges and future directions in cybersecurity education. The national conference will take place in Washington D.C. in June 2020. WCC will collaborate with Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, Illinois, which will develop and disseminate a culminating report detailing conference outcomes and recommendations.
The College will also soon partner on two additional STEM grants from the NSF. The “Learning from Europe’s Cybersecurity Education Models” grant will explore European cybersecurity apprenticeship programs, and WCC will participate in Washington State University’s grant “Values-based Academic Leadership Trajectories for women in STEM.”
About Whatcom: Whatcom Community College in Bellingham, WA is regularly recognized as one of the top 150 community colleges in the nation by the Aspen Institute. The College, a destination for cybersecurity, healthcare and business studies, offers a bachelor of applied science degree, transfer degrees, career preparation, online courses, and community education classes. WCC’s accomplished faculty and staff serve 11,000 students annually. For more information, visit whatcom.edu.