At the center of CyberPatriot is the National Youth Cyber Defense Competition, which puts teams of middle and high school students in the position of newly hired IT professionals tasked with managing the network of a small company. Through a series of online competition rounds, teams are given a set of virtual operating systems and are tasked with finding and fixing cybersecurity vulnerabilities while maintaining critical services. The top teams in the nation earn all-expenses-paid trips to Maryland for the National Finals Competition where they can earn national recognition and scholarship money.
On February 27, 2023, Deputy Secretary of Defense Dr. Kathleen Hicks signed the 2023-2027 DoD Cyber Workforce (CWF) Strategy, which sets the foundation for how the DoD will foster a cyber workforce capable of executing the Departmentā€™s complex and varied cyber missions.
On February 15, 2023, the Department of Defense Chief Information Officer (DoD CIO), Honorable John Sherman, issued DoD Manual (DoDM) 8140.03 Cyberspace Workforce Qualification & Management Program, the third issuance of the DoD 8140 policy series.
