Richland College has been awarded a grant of $510,894 from the National Science Foundation to support and develop the college’s growing Digital Forensics and Information Assurance program.

Richland College has been developing its Digital Forensics program in response to a critical nationwide need for as many as 65,000 new specialists in cybersecurity to prevent and investigate threats to the United States’ cyber infrastructure.

Richland College, the state’s only Center of Academic Excellence for Information Assurance 2-Year Education and Training, currently offers an associate degree and a technical certificate in Digital Forensics and Information Assurance.

The three-year grant will help Richland College also to deliver current cybersecurity courses online and to raise awareness of cybersecurity careers among elementary and secondary school teachers, guidance counselors, students and parents in local school districts including Richardson and Garland. Some 180 undergraduate students as well as 500 K-12 students and 50 teachers will participate in the project.

The grant also provides for Richland College to shape transfer agreements in digital forensics with four-year universities and to create a learning model to help military veterans earn digital forensics course credits and degrees.

For more information about Richland College’s Digital Forensics and Information Assurance program, click here or call 972-238-6210.