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I didn’t qualify for the scholarship because I’m not a high school senior or student in college. I got an email yesterday from the National Cyber Scholarship Foundation announcing the competition results, and that I’m a finalist for the competition. This means that if I was a few years further into school, I could’ve gotten the scholarship.

Competition results are viewable here <- I’m listed on there!

How the rankings work

Scholar: The top 1152 highest scoring students who met the eligibility criteria for a Scholarship (including being in 11th-12th grade or enrolled in an accredited U.S. college), who have each been awarded free access to this summer’s Cyber Foundations Academy and a digital Scholar badge.

Finalist: The highest scoring 2325 students who completed the NCSF Scholarship Application, who will each be awarded a digital Finalist badge.

Semifinalist: The 4521 students who scored at least 20,000 points in CyberStart via CyberStart America or Cyber FastTrack, 1000 points in picoCTF, or Platinum level in CyberPatriot.

What is the scholarship?

The NCSF award would pay for a SANS cybersecurity course and an attempt at the GFACT exam, worth $3,000. The SANS course would prepare you for the GFACT exam, and then the GFACT exan would give you a certification for basic cybersecurity, which could help get you internships.

“The GFACT certification validates a practitioner’s knowledge of essential foundational cybersecurity concepts. GFACT-certified professionals are familiar with practical skills in computers, technology, and security fundamentals that are needed to kickstart a career in cybersecurity.”

GFACT Details:

  • One proctored exam
  • 2 hour long test
  • 75 questions
  • 71% score to pass

What I’ll be doing in the future:

Qualifying for the scholarship would be a great opportunity for me, and getting a chance to take the SANS course would be incredible. I’m going to do what I can to get the scholarship in the future, and I will study as hard as I can to pass the GFACT test. The scholarship and the GFACT test would be a great headstart on my cybersecurity career. So far I have been teaching myself cybersecurity, so a course would be a good boost for me. I’m especially interested in the GFACT exam, because I could be certified in cybersecurity (at least for the foundations) by that exam, and that would be helpful for me in many ways.

In the meantime:

Additionally, although I didn’t get the scholarship, SANS has a free online course called Cyber Aces that I’m going to be studying this summer. Its a beginner course, and it has content on networking, which has been something I’ve been meaning to learn.

This is only the beginning. I’ve begun eyeing competitive programming, and I’m going to start using websites like Leetcode and Hacker Rank. I’m also going to do more programming projects, so that I can have knowledge in both cybersecurity and programming. The school year just ended, so I will have plenty of time for everything over the summer without burning out.

Furthermore, I’m going to compete in both PicoCTF and Cyberstart every year for the next few years, at least throughout high school. This way, I can continue testing my growth over the years, and have some cool activities to add to my college applications.