| | Tim Pettigrew | At 50 years old I decided to change careers. No degree, no security clearance, and no cyber experience. In Colorado Springs Cybersecurity is huge and not having one of those items makes it tough to get your foot in the door sometimes. I chose to go to SecureSet Academy due to it being an immersive program. And when I say immersive, I mean IMMERSIVE. School is Monday through Friday 0800-1700 (or later if you need help with the labs). Then open lab on Saturdays for 4 hours. This is an 800 hour course. That is 800 hours of in-class recorded time. That does not include studying on your own, the open Saturday labs, and the time that you put into the course mentally. At the conclusion of the 20 week CORE Engineering program you have between 400-600 hours of hands-on-keyboard time that is what cybersecurity is all about. The Career Services Manager, Kimberly Hessler knows her stuff. She has been doing it for 30 years. Does she require a lot from you? Yes, she does. You have to do mock interviews, personality assessments, listen to lectures about how to get a job, and write and rewrite your resume about a thousand times. You have to go to networking events, cyber events and Capture the Flag events. But it is all for your benefit. Kimberly helps everyone and can be the difference between getting a job and starting a career. Was the program hard? For me it was. I had been in the medical field for 30 years and that is all I knew. Any IT/computer experience was self-taught. Was I told to do computer labs that were broken and appeared not to work? Yes I was. However, if the labs worked every time it would just be a typing exercise. Figuring out what was wrong with the lab is called troubleshooting and huge part of cyber. Did I go home frustrated many days? Yes I did. But in the end ALL of the frustration, labs, resumes, events, discussions and lectures were worth it. Would I do it again? Yes. Attending SecureSet Academy has been one of the best decisions of my adult life. |
