The John & Mary Franklin Foundation, whose focus is supporting Georgia’s knowledge economy, has awarded Clayton State University $12,000 to help train students for careers in cybersecurity and forensic analysis.

“It is safe to say that almost everyone in the United States has been affected by major data breaches that have exposed our private information to individuals who can harm us. This makes cybersecurity personal to all of us and creates a sense of urgency to prepare our students to address critical workforce shortages in this area,” said Dr. Lila Roberts, dean of the College of Information and Mathematical Sciences.

Building upon its curriculum in robotics and computer science, the University’s College of Information & Mathematical Sciences plans to invest 100 percent of the funds into the latest analytic software designed to detect and counteract cybercrime.

Students will be trained to detect and analyze cyber threats, which pose considerable risk to businesses, educational institutions, and government.

“While there are several open-source software tools for digital forensics, it is important to train our students with software tools widely adopted and deployed by industry and government. This generous award will allow us to acquire annual licenses for the software tool to be used in our cybersecurity classes. We are very excited about the opportunities enabled by this gift and its impacts on the preparedness of our students as the future cybersecurity workforce,” said Dr. Angkul Kongmunvattana, professor and chair of Computer Science at Clayton State.

The focus on cybersecurity at Clayton State means students will be ready to enter into an increasingly competitive workforce for careers that are needed in the nation’s growing “knowledge economy.”

Now more than ever, as companies and organizations face breaches to digital information, employers are seeking professionals that can monitor, assess, and protect vital data.

By 2022, the state of Georgia estimates a need of 4,668 cyber security experts to support the exchange and flow of information across the internet.

“There is a critical nationwide shortage in cybersecurity professionals and this funding will enable Clayton State to make contributions to providing talent to meet these workforce needs. The College of Information and Mathematical Sciences is excited to receive this funding and grateful to the John & Mary Franklin Foundation for their generous gift,” Dr. Roberts said.