SEMO launches cybersecurity degree program

The personal computer. The Internet. The smartphone.

These digital technologies have made modern life easier, more efficient, more reliable.

But technology has a potentially destructive catch -- the people behind it.

"It's more reliable if someone isn't doing something malicious," said James Andrew Lewis, director and senior fellow with the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The technology security expert addressed a crowded room of more than 100 faculty, students and members of the public that were gathered Tuesday afternoon at Southeast Missouri State University's Seabaugh Polytechnic Building for the launch of Southeast's bachelor of science degree in cybersecurity.

The program, set to debut in the fall, will be the only one of its kind in Missouri and one of fewer than 50 in the United States, according to the university. The degree will build upon the foundation of existing university programs -- math, computer science and telecommunications -- with additional courses, including Web application security.

"There is a critical need to protect our digital infrastructure, and there is a critical need for people," said Randy Shaw, Southeast's dean of the School of Polytechnic Studies and Extended Learning.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a 20-percent growth of jobs in the field nationally, accounting for 135,500 jobs in the field by 2018, and Missouri anticipates a 21-percent growth by 2018.

Shaw said the university committee charged with developing the degree program conducted extensive sessions with local, regional and national organizations on the front line of cybersecurity, health care, banking, the government sector, industry and law enforcement.

"We even met with the CIA, in a clandestine hotel room, by the way," Shaw said. He said that locally, Procter & Gamble has expressed strong interest in the development of the cybersecurity program, offering to assist with evolving information in the tech protection field.

Southeast president Dr. Ken Dobbins projects the program's first graduates in two years.

Lewis, who served as project director for the CSIS Commission on Cybersecurity for the Obama administration, said the development of technology, from the days of bulky mainframe computers to the iPad, happened at blazing speed and without much thought paid to potential attackers.

mkittle@semissourian.com

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