1
Preparing CyberSecurity Experts as Adjunct Faculty to Teach at the Post Secondary Level
Shelly Heller, Lance Hoffman and Costis Toregas
The George Washington University
Washington DC 20052
It is a well published concern that in order for the United States to maintain and expand its
capabilities in the world of cybersecurity – whether planning new technologies and the internet of
things (IoT), preparing defenses, constructing offensive tactics, or appropriate policies – a well-educated
workforce is needed. To fill the numerous government jobs, many educational pathways have to be
opened – including job training, community college programs and traditional four year and graduate
programs. Each of these avenues educates and trains individuals to work at different levels and in
different capacities in our ‘cyber’ world. Currently there is a capacity issue: students cannot readily be
added to the education system, especially at the community college level, because trained faculty are
scarce. The weak link in the cybersecurity workforce supply chain is often finding faculty who can be
effective and provide the proper encouragement to students to join the cyber workforce. Therefore,
success depends, in large part, on the capacity of our educational institutions to scale up and absorb
increased numbers of students, as well as the capabilities of our educators.
The nation is looking to our community colleges as an untapped source of cybersecurity
workers. According to the National Science Foundation, “Community colleges can play a critical role in
giving students the hands-on skills that are needed on the front lines (of) defending computer
networks
” According to the American Association of Community Colleges, there has been huge growth
in the percentage of higher education faculty teaching in community colleges and the biggest group
contributing to that growth are part time faculty. And, while some community colleges have existing
programs in cybersecurity and have dedicated full time faculty, according to the Center for Community
College Student Engagement, more than 58% of community college classes are taught by adjunct
faculty. While the data is not broken out by discipline, an informal conversation with local community
colleges is that they rely heavily on adjunct faculty, and many adjuncts may have no teaching
experience. A typical advertisement for a cyber-security faculty member at a community college
includes “Bachelor's degree (Master's preferred) and five years of work experience as Computer
Forensics professional, technical qualifications: (CompTIA Network+, CompTIA Security+, CISCO
certifications, CISSP, SANS, Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH)), knowledge of Programming Languages,
excellent written and oral communications skills, experience in leadership including a history initiating
and managing change, working with others toward shared goals and developing others.” These
