Hard work will only get you so far if you do not have a good reason for doing it. My reason is to strengthen my IT knowledge and computer skills to help those who are attacked and affected by malicious hackers.

I am Shelby Rotella, a cybersecurity major with the class of 2027. My hobbies include gaming, streaming, bowling, and learning about computers and their hardware. While my skills are minimal as of 2025, I chose cybersecurity both for my love of messing with computers and my desire to protect and help people when they are facing a crisis.

I originally was a biology major chasing that same desire to help people; however, I realized through trial and error that pursuing a life science field was not the path for me. I took some time off for the Spring 2025 semester to search myself for what I really wanted to do with my life, and that journey led to me pursue cybersecurity.

I see so many people, especially elderly folks, fall victim to cyber scams everyday and it absolutely breaks my heart to see it and the lack of education for them to help stop attacks like these from happening. I would love to learn everything about cybersecurity and apply my skills to help both prevent people from falling victim to scams and help people recover from attacks by getting their data back and holding the people that pulled off the attacks accountable.