MECHANICSBURG, Pa. – Thirteen students selected for employment at Naval Supply Systems Command (NAVSUP) Business Systems Center (BSC) through the Department of Defense (DOD) Cyber Scholarship Program (CySP), completed a 10-week summer session at NAVSUP BSC, August 12.
The summer session served as an opportunity for students to work on programs supporting Navy supply chain readiness and was the second of a two-part program designed to familiarize and acclimate students with federal civilian service at NAVSUP BSC.
“We operate in a highly competitive environment, and recruiting, developing, and retaining a highly-skilled civilian workforce is essential to accomplishing our mission,” said Brian Zirbel, executive director, NAVSUP BSC. “The DOD CySP is an indispensable tool that helps us attract new, qualified candidates with the right talent and motivation to complement our current team of information technology experts.”
During the 10-week summer session, students completed administrative processing and training and worked on projects across five departments supporting 12 NAVSUP BSC efforts including Robotic Process Automation; One Touch Support; Fusion Center; Navy Enterprise Web; Naval Operational Supply System; and migrating applications to use Azure Pipelines creating Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD).
“This year we were able to provide them exposure to cross-functional teams and customers throughout the command,” said Kelly Nave, DOD CySP program coordinator, NAVSUP BSC. “This provided them an opportunity to network with their peers and project teams as well as learn new skills, tools, and processes.”
This new approach was beneficial for NAVSUP BSC as well.
“Our cyber scholar, Christopher Wagner, was free from ongoing workloads, which allowed him to invest the few hours it took to implement an automated build and test process," said Gary Plattenberg, technical engagement lead, NAVSUP BSC. “The build process outputs are extremely valuable for quick feedback mechanisms to developers and make them more efficient, both individually and as a team."
Wagner, a Computer Science major at Towson University, worked on the Development, Security, and Operations (DevSecOps) Launchpad team to help integrate continuous integration pipelines into their application development workflows using Azure Pipelines.
“In the eight working weeks I had at NAVSUP BSC, we successfully created more than 30 pipelines, taught training sessions, and created thorough documentation including guides on how to integrate MF Fortify for Static Code Analyzer (SCA) scans,” said Wagner. “I am looking forward to being a change agent to help NAVSUP BSC transition to more DevSecOps initiatives,” I am passionate about DevSecOps, and it will make coming to work very exciting.”
The 13 students who completed the summer session came from regional colleges and universities, including Farleigh Dickinson University, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, The Pennsylvania State University, and Towson University. After completion of the two-part orientation, graduating students are hired as full-time employees. Senior-year and advanced degree students return to college to finish academic requirements.
“I chose to work with NAVSUP BSC because I saw the best opportunity to grow in the fields that interested me,” said Gabby Garrett, cyber scholar and Computer Science major, Cyber Operations track at Towson University. “This summer has allowed me various opportunities to learn and grow. The resources at NAVSUP BSC are amazing, and they enable their employees to take advantage of them. It not only betters the command but also allows each employee to grow as well.”
As of August, NAVSUP BSC has hired 35 employees in IT career fields through the DOD CySP, including Tanya Wang, cyber scholar and Data Science graduate at Pennsylvania State University.
“I think it was fate that NAVSUP BSC chose me. The minute the match was made, I knew I was in the right place,” said Wang. “I learned a lot through this program about agile framework and the responsibilities of being a business analyst, all of which I've never had experience with before. I was able to connect with a lot of people and learn things not taught in traditional classrooms.” Wang will serve as an information technology specialist for the NAVSUP BSC Core Business Solutions Department’s Financial Management System Information Technology Division upon completion of the summer session.
The DOD CySP is sponsored by the DOD Chief Information Officer and administered by the National Security Agency to recruit and retain cyber and IT specialists. Scholarship recipients incur a six-month service commitment to the DOD for each semester students receive tuition, stipend, book allowance, and a paid summer internship. To apply for the program, students must be enrolled in an institution certified as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity. Applicants must submit a package to the DOD CySP program office that includes university sponsor signoff, resume, transcripts, essay response, and two letters of recommendation. Packages are due in February each year to be considered for the scholarship starting in the fall semester.
NAVSUP BSC provides the Navy with information systems support through the design, development, and maintenance of systems in the functional areas of logistics, supply chain management, transportation, finance, and accounting and is one of 11 commands under Commander, NAVSUP.
For more information about NAVSUP BSC, visit https://www.navsup.navy.mil/NAVSUP-Enterprise/NAVSUP-Business-Systems-Center/.
For more information on the DOD CySP, visit https://public.cyber.mil/dcysp/.
Date Taken: | 08.12.2022 |
Date Posted: | 08.26.2022 05:11 |
Story ID: | 428088 |
Location: | MECHANICSBURG, PENNSYLVANIA, US |
Web Views: | 130 |
Downloads: | 0 |
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