NEW CYBER SECURITY PROGRAM LAUNCHED
Earlier this year, Seneca College’s Faculty of Continuing Education launched a Cyber Security Ontario Graduate Certificate program, which, says the faculty’s chair, is designed to address what he calls a glaring talent gap.
“In spite of many powerful innovations to make us more cyber secure, both governmental and private sectors have failed to address the glaring talent gap in this field,” says Denis Gravelle. “There is a worrisome shortage of individuals with the skills and experience needed to protect us against the asymmetrical threats we face. And, according to a January 2017 article in Forbes magazine, ‘cyber security roles rank among the most difficult to fill in the enterprise, with the talent gap in this field expected to reach 1.8 million jobs by 2022.’”
Seneca’s part-time program, says Gravelle, provides students with key concepts of information security, and the technical and practical job skills necessary to secure, protect and defend network infrastructures and an organization’s valuable data assets. Students also gain a broad understanding of cyber security concepts, industry best practices for information security, and key security concepts to protect an organization against fraud, data breaches and other vulnerabilities.
“The offering provides occupation-specific training and services required to help participants prepare for employment in this highly skilled, non-regulated profession,” says Gravelle. “Due to the content and level of knowledge, the program is geared to participants who already work in the IT sector.”
Each of the program’s 12 courses — which students can take one at a time with credits being recognized by the college for up to 10 years — reinforces acquired knowledge through practice labs, says Gravelle. The final course, meanwhile, is a capstone project course, which integrates all of the knowledge and skills taught in the program.
“This course gives students the opportunity to design and implement a comprehensive information security architecture for a fictional company from the planning and design phase through presentation of the final product,” he says.
Conveniently delivered as an online offering, the Cyber Security program’s courses are available for enrollment every semester. In fall 2017, Seneca will be offering specific part-time courses in Cyber Security at its Markham Campus.