iKeepSafe’s 2020 NICE K12 Cybersecurity Education Conference was a huge success. A completely virtual event, it was the largest conference to date with 550 attendees and about 300 students. We will provide more details recapping the four general sessions with four keynote speakers, as well as the thirty breakout sessions in six tracks (including the first ever student track!) in the next few weeks. 

However, we wanted to immediately announce the sad news that Randy Ramos, CEO and founder of Global Business Solutions Inc (GSI), and our Student Track Sponsor, passed away on December 18, 2020. He was a dedicated member of the NICE K12 Conference Planning Committee, and worked side by side with us to develop the student track programming and agenda. 

Randy was a passionate champion of providing access to information about cybersecurity careers to as may students as possible. Through GBSI, over 300 students and their teachers were able to attend the full conference free of charge. He also organized a team of ten of his staff to be Session Chairs for our pre-conference workshops and breakout sessions. They worked for 4 days as volunteers. We could not have put on the conference without them!

In his memory, the Student Track videos have been made available to ALL students and educators at no cost via the conference website. The video titles and descriptions are below. Please visit the NICE K12 Conference website to view and share them. 

VIDEO 1: ‘A Day in the Life’ at the US Cyber Security Operations Center. Learn how the men and women of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) build the national capacity to defend against cyber-attacks and works with the federal government to provide cybersecurity tools, incident response and assessment capabilities to safeguard the ‘.gov’ networks that support essential operations, departments and agencies. Specialists in this organization work behind the scenes making sure systems and networks Americans rely on are there when they need them. Maybe this is a team you want to join!

VIDEO 2:  Interview with a Hacker. How does a hacker think and operate? Learn about what makes a hacker tick. Hear how this hacker, Mark Rogers pulled off one of the most publicized hacks ever!

VIDEO 3: How I’m Hacking you Right Now! Any device connected to the internet makes you vulnerable to a cyber-attack. An attack that can disable your electronic services, delete your back account, or blanket the internet with your personal information and disinformation. These devices and your social media accounts make you vulnerable. What are you doing, or not doing that makes you vulnerable to cyber-attacks?

VIDEO 4: Panel – What it takes to get a Cyber Job: Learn from cybersecurity industry experts about who they’re hiring. Learn about the skills, knowledge, capabilities, characteristics, and certifications they’re looking for in candidates they’re hiring today and expecting to hire in the future.

To Donate to the Randy Ramos Scholarship Fund, please click here: Remembering Randy