Episode 29 Kevin Nolten - ”Shreveport-Bossier: My City, My Community, My Home”

Kevin Nolten, Vice President of the Cyber Innovation Center, sits down with Jeffrey Goodman, Director of Marketing and Development for the YMCA of Northwest Louisiana to answer the following questions:

 

0:50 1. All right, Kevin, you are the Vice President of the Cyber Innovation Center located in Bossier City.

 

If I do nothing else today, I want to clarify for the audience what cyber is, why people should care and what type of work is happening at this incredible campus on the eastern part of our community.

 

The campus is multi-faceted, housing I believe four buildings – the Cyber Innovation Center, General Dynamics Information Technology, the Bossier Parish Community College STEM/Louisiana Tech Academic Success Center and the Louisiana Tech Research Institute.

 

I’m not sure we will cover all four buildings but if we do our job today, people will at least have a much better handle on what all is happening at your 3,000 acre National Cyber Research Park.

 

Let’s start here. Please define in simple terms the word cyber for us lay people.

 

5:52 2. One of your missions at the Cyber Innovation Center is to educate and develop a knowledge-based workforce around STEM (science, technology, engineering and math)-related fields.

 

To that end, one of the divisions or arms of the Cyber Innovation Center is cyber.org.

 

In August of last year, cyber.org launched K-12 cybersecurity learning standards. It was the first national effort to align cybersecurity criteria and curriculum across all 50 states. Talk to me about how a K-12 school and K-12 educators connect with cyber.org and begin to utilize the curriculum you have developed.

 

14:01 3. I came across this quote of yours, “the U.S. is expected to face a shortage of 1.8 million skilled cybersecurity workers by 2022, making educating and empowering the next generation of cybersecurity professionals imperative to our future national and economic security.”

 

To date, cyber.org has influenced over 20,000 K-12 educators to teach and introduce cyber concepts to over three million students in all 50 states. But with over 52 million students in the country, we still have a lot of work to do.

 

How do we as a country speed up our efforts in cybersecurity education so that we properly meet the cybersecurity workforce demand in the future?

 

20:14 4. You once said, “a student can leave high school, attend BPCC for a 2-year degree, walk across a parking lot to the Academic Success Center to continue their education for a 4-year degree, and then literally walk across the street for a full time job at GDIT.”

 

What can I do as a parent if I want to ensure that my kid is properly prepared to have a career in STEM and/or cybersecurity?

 

27:28 5. What kind of careers exist locally for someone with a proper STEM and cybersecurity education?

 

31:28 6. Lastly, what can we do as a community to help you leverage the incredible asset you have built at the National Cyber Research Park? Specifically, how can we bolster your efforts to recruit and retain the nation’s best and brightest?