At UMass a special scholarship is offered to 3rd year students in CE/CS/Math/Stats etc(I’m intending to do CE, I’m an incoming freshman)who specialize in cybersecurity. The scholarship covers full tuition and an additional stipend of 20k or so. The thing is I’d have to work at a government agency nsa/cia/fbi etc in cybersecurity for how many ever years I take the scholarship for… Let’s say I take it for both the 3rd and 4th year so I’d have to work for 2 years for those agencies. Now if I don’t take this scholarship I’d have to take private loans for the whole of my tuition. To give a better idea of what I’m looking at, My cost of attendance is around 19k per year after scholarships and doesn’t include 7k per year in federal loans… So I’m basically looking at around 26k per year and if I don’t take the scholarship it’ll be 38k in private loans for me after graduation apart from the federal loans. I really need some advice. The scholarship looks to be a no brainer, but is it worth committing to as I have no idea what cybersecurity work be like.
How do you know you will actually get the scholarship? What if you don’t?
If you can’t afford this school now, you won’t be able to afford the school later.
It’s a scholarship that comes with a condition that you are unsure you will complete.
You may like cybersecurity. Or not.
What are your other school options?
I have already committed to Umass.
My parents have planned for my first 2 to 2 and a half years. And that’s no issue. And I might even be able to afford it in the 3rd and 4th year without taking additional loans. But I’d like to avoid taking money from my parents and hence I’ve started thinking about the scholarship or private loans. The scholarship is pretty much open to anyone in the majors specified above but with the condition of working in a government agency.
I assume you are talking about CyberCorps? I’ve looked into that for my son (not at UMass, but that same program is offered at dozens of schools around the country) but not as a way to make an unaffordable school affordable. It does seem like a fine program for students who really like cybersecurity and would like to do government work, or at least won’t mind government work for a few years. However, the scholarship is competitive and there’s no guarantee you’ll get it. Also if you have no current background in cybersecurity you are taking a big risk assuming you will like it enough to study it intensively and then work in the field for years, dealing with government bureaucracy as well as the actual technical work. In my son’s case he only wanted to apply to CyberCorps schools (except possibly MIT) just to give himself the option after he loved a summer cybersecurity program he did. But he definitely isn’t counting on that scholarship to make his college work. He may end up specializing in cybersecurity but without applying to CyberCorps so that he can go into the much-higher-paying private sector instead of the lower-paying government jobs, or at least be able to have that choice. If money is your primary reason for considering CyberCorps I’d strongly caution against it. Instead, you should do everything you can to make yourself competitive for paid summer internships or co-ops, and get money that way. When you get to UMass find the CyberCorps coordinator and speak to that person about the program and how to know if it’s right for you. The coordinator will be a key person to know if you do find you love cybersecurity, because that person will be able to help you be competitive for the scholarship.
Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.
One of my roommates last summer (during my internship) was in Scholarship for Service.
It’s a great program and they really enjoyed it!
When do you have to apply? Because it is, in fact, fairly competitive. If you have the year to explore before you have to apply, I’d recommend learning as much about cybersecurity as you can in that time to see if you want to go into it.
One great thing is that summer pay at the agencies for interns is quite high compared to the private sector, and also with quite comparable for your first few years of employment. It is those with experience that find the private sector much more higher-paying. Its quite common for people in the SfS program to leave for the private sector after they’ve finished their commitment to the government.