University of Hawaiʻi–West Oʻahu cybersecurity students were honored by the Hawaiʻi State Senate and the National Security Agency (NSA) at the UH West Oʻahu Cybersecurity Coordination Center and Red Team Award Ceremony on March 9.
“We awarded some very talented and skilled students for their achievements, and invited back some of our Cybersecurity Center graduates, who are now working hard to protect our state and national critical services,” said Matt Chapman, professor of computer science and cybersecurity at UH West Oʻahu. “Bringing together this group was really exciting for me personally, having our students and graduates together to share their experiences and accomplishments.”
The Hawaiʻi State Senate awarded members of the 2022 UH West Oʻahu Red Team with a certificate of recognition sponsored by Sen. Michelle Kidani. The NSA recognized UH West Oʻahu for its team participation in the National Centers of Academic Excellence NSA Cyber Exercise in April 2022.
The UH West Oʻahu Red Team consists of Captain Anthony Eich, Casey Kuwada, Christopher Lopez, Jonathan Means, Chad Miura, Nina Pandya, Brendon Sarisky and Chapman as coach.
“We are incredibly honored by the recognition awarded by the Hawaiʻi State Senate,” said Chapman. “I can’t tell you how much we appreciate Sen. Kidani sponsoring this effort, and the entire Senate for honoring these talented, hard-working students, who will play a big part in protecting our state from cyber threats.”
Each year, more than 10,000 students from more than 500 colleges and universities and 100 high schools participate in National Cyber League (NCL) competitions, which test students’ skills in identifying hackers from forensic data, pentesting (penetration testing) and auditing vulnerable websites, recovering from ransomware attacks and more.
The UH West Oʻahu cybersecurity program is currently ranked No. 14 by NCL in overall college power rankings and No. 7 in the Western region. These rankings represent the ability of students to perform real-world cybersecurity tasks on the Cyber Skyline platform, and are based on top team performance, top student’s individual performance and the aggregate individual performance of students.
Additionally, Red Team member Means is ranked as one of the top 100 students in the country in a pool of more than 7,000 competitors.
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