Rick Driggers, deputy assistant director for cybersecurity, CISA at the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) answers the question: What do you see as the most important tool to bolster the federal IT workforce? Watch Rick Driggers' full comments here.

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With over 1,500 institutions and hundreds of thousands of students who use AWS Educate, we wanted to take you on a trip around the world and highlight how students are learning and innovating with the cloud. Learn more.

Crafting (and changing) minds

There is now some hard data to show that Coding it Forward’s Civic Digital Fellowship can have a lasting impact on participants’ career trajectories and, by the same token, the future tech workforce of the federal government. A survey of summer 2019’s 55 participants, administered both before and after the program by the Partnership for Public Service, shows fellows walk away from the 10-week program more likely than before to seek a job in the federal government. The numbers are pretty dramatic — in the pre-fellowship survey, zero students said they’d be “extremely likely” to pursue a job in the federal government after graduation. In the post-fellowship survey, 23% said they would be. On the other end of the scale, the percentage of students saying they are “unlikely” to work for the federal government went down from 22% before the program to 10% after. Tajha Chappellet-Lanier has more.

Computer science coming to the Ozarks

Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced the formation of a new cross-jurisdictional group on Friday tasked with exploring the computer science and cybersecurity offerings of the state’s educational system. Created via executive order, the State Computer Science and Cybersecurity Task Force is composed of leaders from the education, private industry and government sectors, providing the state with analysis of the current computer science workforce pipeline and making recommendations. In addition to officials from the state government’s education departments, the state’s top technology official, Chief Technology Officer Yessica Jones, is also included in the 31-person group. Colin Wood has more.

Retention efforts should start on Day 1

We talked to a number of experts on the sidelines of the Workforce Summit to get advice on how agencies can recruit and retain talent. Hear from:

• VMware's Pete Romano
• Salesforce's Amy Regan Morehouse
• Monster's Susan Fallon Brown
• ServiceNow's Tracey Fritcher
• ServiceNow's Jonathan Alboum

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Cloud, AI skills top list of talent needs for federal government CIOs, report finds

Seven in 10 federal government IT leaders, in a new FedScoop/WorkScoop survey, say continuing IT skills gaps have a high or medium impact on the ability for agencies to deliver on their mission. The study highlights the top skills agencies will be looking for over the next two years and steps they’re taking to upskill or reskill their workforce. Read the report here.

Job of the Day

CISO |Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

As a global leader in public health, CDC works to respond, contain, and eliminate disease. Whether we are protecting the American people from health threats, investigating emerging diseases, or mobilizing public health programs with our domestic and international partners, we rely on our employees to make a real difference in protecting the health and safety of people here and around the world. See this job and more.