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The San Diego Business Journal and Cyber Center of Excellence (CCOE) are excited to announce the winners of the inaugural Cybersecurity Stewardship Awards. These awards celebrate companies, academic institutions, municipalities, government agencies, nonprofits, and the Cybersecurity Executive of the Year, going above and beyond to innovate new technologies and solutions, seed and diversify the talent pipeline, and create a more secure San Diego.

Cybersecurity is now everyone’s business. With the FBI reporting a 300% increase in cybercrimes across all industries during the pandemic and a global shortfall of 3.5 million cyber professionals, it’s more critical than ever to address this systemic risk. We are so proud to see the San Diego region heeding the call and working together to develop the next generation of cyber warriors, defenses, and innovations.

The Journeys Map team is proud to be recognized as the San Diego Business Journal’s 2021 Cybersecurity Stewardship Workforce Development Award. This award recognizes the work we have done over the past four years to help bring new life and interactivity to the NICE Framework. Our work has included presentations at multiple NIST Conferences, sitting on the NICE/NIST career pathways taskforce, and more recently being awarded CASCADE II and CADENCE grants to continue to build out the map. These grants have allowed us to bring on other schools or organizations, such as the East County EDC, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Syned, who have integrated the Cybersecurity map into their website and offerings.

“We are honored to receive this award and be recognized for the hard work and partnership that Journeys Map has built with many in the Cybersecurity community,” said Peter Sibley, CEO of Journeys Map. “With the growth of the industry only expected to increase at an even faster pace, it is our mission to help bridge the gap between individuals looking to get into the Cybersecurity industry, educators and industry.”

The Journeys Map team looks forward to not only continuing to build out within the Cybersecurity industry, but also helping to support all industries. Biotech, Healthcare, Engineering, FinTech and everything in-between. There is a growing need to map the skills needed by industry with the pathways individuals embark on to reach their professional goals. If you are interested in exploring how we can support your work, reach out to hi@journeysmap.com today! 

The Journeys Map team had been fans of the work Junior Achievement for a long time, so when we got the chance to partner with them, we were eager to jump on the opportunity. Read on to learn more about how we are working together close make career exploration fun and engaging!

What is Junior Achievement?

Junior Achievement has 104 local JA Areas across the nation, and together they are the nation’s largest organization dedicated to giving young people the knowledge and skills they need to own their economic success, plan for their futures, and make smart academic and economic choices. JA’s programs—in the core content areas of work readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy—ignite the spark in young people to experience and realize the opportunities and realities of work and life in the 21st century. Junior Achievement’s purpose is to inspire and prepare young people to succeed in a global economy.

What about Junior Achievement San Diego?

Since 1950, Junior Achievement of San Diego County has provided life-changing programs to more than 1 million young people—in the classroom and after school—to foster an understanding of how the “real world” works. To ensure young people are prepared for their future, JA teaches them how to get a job, start a business and how to manage money. JA programs reach every ethnic and economic demographic. For many students, the JA experience is a major highlight of their academic year. More than 5,000 volunteers annually, including 40 board members and a staff of 21 help to impact over 35,000 students each year and empower them to become “real world ready.”

How are we working together?

Journeys Map and Junior Achievement San Diego have partnered together to bring our engaging career exploration tool to the students taking part in the JA Finance Park experience. JA Finance Park helps students build a foundation upon which they can make intelligent financial decisions that last a lifetime, including decisions related to income, expenses, savings, and credit. 

The JA Finance Park program is composed of 6 to 13 teacher-taught, in-class lessons. While completoing these in-class lessons the students are directed to a custom Journeys Map experience that has been built out for our partnership. It is during this experience that the students are able to complete a JA pre-test, receive both the RIASEC interest traits and skills matches as well as explore over 160 careers tied back to their specific skills and interests. It is during this process that each students selects a role to play while visiting Finance Park. By matching the student’s skills and interests and letting them self-select their role, engagement increases and they are motivated to dive deeper into their career exploration.

The program culminates with a hands-on experiential learning budgeting simulation at the JA campus in Mission Valley San Diego. Additional extension activities are available for each theme: Income, Savings Insurance and Risk Management, Credit and Debit, and Budgeting. Lesson differentiation includes traditional implementation, project-based learning (PBL) implementation, and simulation only options that can be utilized in a middle thru high school classrooms and afterschool settings.

“At Junior Achievement we prepare our young people for their economic success, connecting them to their futures and the endless possibilities that exist. Journeys maps has been the interactive tool for which we are able to provide students a better understanding of their strengths and interests and how those directly connect to successful career pathways. As both implementation and thought partners, Journeys Maps continues to support JA San Diego with resources that enhance our experiential learning opportunities. The Journeys Map platform not only provides our students with exposure to viable career pathways but shows them how to make their dreams a reality.” 

The Journeys Map team is proud to be able to collaborate with our local JA in San Diego. We look forward to expanding our programs together as well as supporting other JA locations nationwide and the 5M students that visit each year.

With 500,000 total Cybersecurity job openings and 1,000,000 employed nationwide, and growing rapidly, to say Cybersecurity represents a high growth industry would be an understatement. That’s why the Journeys Map team has been thrilled to have been working closely with Cybersecurity industry experts to identify pathways and close the skills gap in this vital industry.   

Background

In 2017 the Journeys Map team was lucky enough to partner with the San Diego Cyber Center of Excellence (CCOE). CCOE is a non-profit that focuses on regional planning and program implementation in order to address cybersecurity workforce, economic development and infrastructure challenges through collaboration with industry, academia and government agencies. CCOE was created to support the growth of the cyber industry, promote cybersecurity in San Diego and provide a template to mobilize other regions. San Diego is a hub of Cybersecurity activity, with more than 150 firms focused on Cybersecurity that are being fed 3,200 students each year graduating from local universities and colleges in computer science and engineering fields. In addition, San Diego is home to the Navy’s Naval Information Warfare Systems Command (NAVWAR). NAVWAR directly employs nearly half of all the cyber security jobs in San Diego (>3,500) and its presence in San Diego is a major talent attraction and economic driver.

With that as the framework, the goal of our partnership was to launch a Cybersecurity focused version of Journeys Map that would map education, training and career pathways to the Cybersecurity industry.

“With the FBI reporting a 300% increase in cybercrime during the pandemic and a global shortfall of 3.5 million cyber professionals, it’s more critical than ever to address the cybersecurity workforce gap. CCOE and Journey’s Map are heading the call to help seed and diversify the talent pipeline for this high-paying industry!” said Lisa Easterly, San Diego Cyber Center of Excellence President & CEO. “In collaboration with the State of California, U.S. Department of Defense and cyber industry leaders, CCOE and Journeys Map created the Cyber Career Map based on the NICE Framework, where users can create FREE personalized career journeys catering to their skills and interests including education, certifications, work-based learning resources and so much more. Thank you Journeys Map for helping create such a powerful, yet easy-to-use tool to inspire the next generation of cyber warriors!”

Rapid Growth

From the time we launched the pilot version of the Cybersecurity map, which leverages the NICE Framework, both the Journeys Map and CCOE teams have been off and running. Our work together has included presentations at multiple NIST Conferences, sitting on the NICE/NIST career pathways taskforce, and more recently being awarded CASCADE II and CADENCE grants to continue to build out the map. These grants have allowed us to bring on other schools or organizations, such as the East County EDC, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Syned, who have integrated the Cybersecurity map into their website and offerings.

“East County EDC, as its contribution to the DoD-funded, State-led effort, partnered with CCOE — and contributors from industry, government, and education/workforce — to research, design, and implement an overlay on the Cyber Career Map to add the Work-Based Learning (WBL) opportunities that provide students and job seekers with hands-on experience that the Cyber industry demands.” said James Sly, CEO of the East County Economic Development Council. “Journeys Map seamlessly incorporated these Cyber WBL, the majority of which are evergreen, into the Career Map to augment an individual’s pursuit of a customized pathway to a rewarding cyber career. The Cyber Industry told us that future cyber warriors need both experience and education/training to be successful candidates for cyber jobs. Journeys Map made it possible to add these WBL opportunities and a simple and effective manner.”

How It Works

We start by leveraging the NICE Framework, allowing Journeys Map to integrate industry accepted career pathway data. Every career destination has multiple pathways and alternatives can be compared. Journeys Map works by translating career pathways, jobs, skills, experience, degrees, certifications and even concepts to GPS positions on a map that extends from

birth to retirement. Every career has a dashboard featuring relevant data on a real-time

Supporting All Industries

The Journeys Map team looks forward to not only continuing to build out within the Cybersecurity industry, but also helping to support all industries. Biotech, Healthcare, Engineering, FinTech and everything in-between. There is a growing need to map the skills needed by industry with the pathways individuals embark on to reach their professional goals. If you are interested in exploring how we can support your work, reach out to hi@journeysmap.com today!