NSF PR 02-66 - August 7, 2002
Scholarship for Service Awards Expanded After President
Signs Supplemental Budget Bill
NSF grants add to student
base, help to expand institutional "capacity building"
President Bush has signed into law the fiscal 2002
Supplemental Appropriations Act (Public Law 107-206)
adding $19.3 million to NSF's budget to expand a program
designed to help reduce critical shortages of computer
security and information assurance professionals in
the public and private sectors through education scholarships.
NSF had just completed a second round of grants originally
budgeted for 2002 worth more than $11.5 million to
expand both scholarship and capacity building efforts
within the Scholarship for Service (SFS) program when
the supplemental appropriations measure was signed
into law.
NSF will award new SFS grants within a few months,
expected to focus on scholarship activities.
Five institutions did receive four-year NSF awards
worth over $10 million from NSF's original 2002 budget
to provide undergraduate and graduate degrees in computer
security and information assurance. Nine additional
two-year awards worth about $1.5 million were made
to universities and colleges, and their partners,
to build their "capacities" for degree programs and
assist them in qualifying as Centers of Academic Excellence
in Information Assurance. These centers are so defined
by the National Security Agency (NSA) under a 1998
presidential directive that established as a national
priority the protection of the nation's infrastructure
and communications systems. NSA became the lead agency
in a multi-faceted government cyber security effort,
under which NSF has the responsibility for providing
education of information security professionals (commonly
referred to as the cyber corps) and establishing education
infrastructure and curricula under the SFS program.
"It's time to be as smart about cyber security as we
are about cyberspace," said NSF Deputy Director Joseph
Bordogna in remarks at the U.S. Air Force Research
Lab in Rome, New York July 31. There, he announced
a capacity-building award to Utica College, which
is heading a collabortion among several local schools.
"We need many more of our nation's most promising
young minds focused on the growing cyber threats to
national security and to bring the same level of innovation
to cyber security research and education that has
served us so well in advancing information and communications
technologies over the past decade."
Under SFS, students receive two-year undergraduate
and graduate-level scholarships, and opportunities
to serve in a government internship. Following graduation,
they complete a specified employment commitment with
the federal government before deciding whether to
pursue government or private sector careers.
NSF's newest scholarship awards went to Polytechnic
University of New York ($2.9 million) Georgia Institute
of Technology ($2.5 million), University of North
Carolina, Charlotte ($1.66 million), Mississippi State
University ($912,000) and Jackson State University
($222,000). More than 100 students in undergraduate
and graduate programs are expected to receive degrees
through these scholarships.
The institutional capacity building awards for 2002
included Utica College ($199,900) and Polytechnic
University ($198,000) of New York, Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh ($202,000), University of
Albany ($200,000), Clark University in Atlanta ($400,000),
the Naval Postgraduate School in California ($184,000),
Mississippi State University ($158,900), Jackson State
University ($127,500), and the University of Kansas
($41,100).
In May 2001, NSF awarded its first scholarship grants
to Carnegie Mellon, Iowa State and Purdue universities,
as well as the University of Idaho, University of
Tulsa and the Naval Postgraduate School. Subsequent
capacity-building awards were issued to the University
of Missouri at Rolla, the University of South Carolina
at Columbia, Purdue and Iowa State universities, Indiana
University of Pennsylvania, Towson University (Maryland),
Georgia Tech, and Embry Riddle Aerospace University
(Florida).
NSF also transferred $430,000 to the U.S. Office of
Personnel Management (OPM) as part of a memorandum
of understanding under which OPM manages parts of
the SFS program. OPM provides internship and full-time
employment opportunities to students who train and
graduate from the SFS program.
NSF's overall commitment to the SFS program was about
$11.2 million per year from 2001 to 2003 until the
new law was signed.
For more information, see: http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ehr/DUE/programs/sfs/
and http://www.nsa.gov/isso/programs/nietp/index.htm
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