Electronic Portfolio Project
Introduction:
My experience with the Old Dominion University cybersecurity program has been a challenging yet fruitfully beneficial opportunity for me to grow in the field of cybersecurity. Cybersecurity has taught me thus far that there is an endless amount of growth that can be attained in the field and to not be discouraged when one concept area is not specialty with the many other fields that may be a better fit of interest. I’ve gained a numerous amount of skills related to cybersecurity and beyond. Many skills related to cybersecurity such as Cloud computing, encryption, and various ethical hacking skills have been key highlights to my experience with the program. Additionally, skills such as communication, patience, and collaboration have been greatly increased after completing the program with the many courses and experiences I’ve participated in.
Program Reflection:
My most memorable experiences here at ODU have been making connections with other students/teachers, learning about various ways to succeed in cybersecurity outside of the classroom, and attending events to gain more exposure to cybersecurity and job opportunity. Each of these factors have played a critical role in the career path I’ve chosen to take today and are key factors on what has helped me to be successful and motivated to complete my degree.
Though I’ve come a long way in my journey with the program, I’ve also faced key challenges like any other student in the program. One main challenge was finding my specific interest in cybersecurity. The program is very broad with many different niches to explore. This factor made it very difficult to decide which niche interest me the most and where I should place most of my time to exploring. I’ve continually worked to overcome this problem by evaluating what the courses I’ve taken and self-evaluating what I’ve liked to do and what I don’t like to do. I’ve also catered some of my earlier courses exploring the field then catering my later courses to skills that will be beneficial to my career niche later. My earlier work in courses such as CYSE 301 has helped to realize I like to know and configure the technical side of cybersecurity using tools such as cloud computing. Additionally, my earlier course of CYSE 270 has also helped me to realize my technical passion for coding and using scripts. These have been critical factors in catering my later courses to help me advance my skills into the cloud security world such as with my experience using AWS.
IDS 493 Reflection
IDS 493 is an interdisciplinary studies course to reflect upon a student’s academic studies, work experiences, skills, and any other related material to them and their major in one creative and personalized portfolio. I’ve learned various critical pieces through this course such as how to professionally and creatively express my experiences through an online website. By taking time to cultivate a cohesive webpage that reflects upon who I am as a student, I’ve been able to learn the power of expressing my abilities and experiences in a project that could be used for future endeavors. I am most proud of explaining my courses and how they’ve affected me though-out the portfolio. I’ve been able to critically and accurately explain my experiences from page-to-page in a manner that coherently details what I’ve done, learned, and gained from every course I’ve presented.
The most challenging part throughout my portfolio was the layout and design of it. I didn’t initially have a clear direction of how I wanted my page to look and through-out the process, it’s taken time to develop this design idea. I was able to figure out my vision by testing different designs and getting inspiration from other classmates and examples. With more time, I could improve the transition and maybe the background layout to potentially have more “flare” or draw more attention than just the white background. My previous courses helped me to find easier success by giving me assignments to familiarize myself with Word-press from an earlier time. This helped me immensely on the amount of time spent inserting, editing, and arranging pages into the vision I had for them.
Conclusion
To conclude, I’ve gained many skills, experienced many trials and tribulations, and learned various aspects about cybersecurity and myself from completing this course. I’ve gained many memorable experiences about cybersecurity through connecting with student/instructors, doing my own research outside of the classroom, and attending various cyber-related events. Additionally, the courses have challenged me in many ways and have helped me to find my path in cybersecurity. Furthermore, this course has helped me to express my experiences professionally and creatively in a descriptive and structured manner.
Interdisciplinary theories were helpful in understanding my coursework due to requiring research and review of my previous courses and fully evaluate what I’ve learned. For instance, I was able to connect my correlations between my previous courses and how they’ve impacted my career path moving forward. It is critical to be an interdisciplinary thinker in the field of cybersecurity due to the need to evaluate and be critical of every many aspects along with needing to properly express your finding in a professional manner.
From my time, experiences, and connections I’ve gained from this program and ODU, I plan to continue my education at ODU to obtain my master’s degree in cybersecurity. This degree will help to open-up more opportunities I am looking to attain and provide me with more knowledge and experiences to be successful in the cybersecurity field. After completing this degree, I plan to attain a position related to cloud security to further explore and work toward my interest with cybersecurity and cloud computing.