2020 Year End Report

Message from Leadership

What did we do this year?

As part of the Federal Government's largest counterintelligence and security agency, we continued to educate, train, and certify millions of civilian and military personnel and cleared contractors entrusted to protect our national security.

In March, we celebrated a decade of security learning achievement, delivering award-winning curricula and content.

We put safety first.

In March, we postponed all instructor-led training due to the COVID-19 pandemic. To ensure that students still received their required training, we made our three most popular instructor-led courses available virtually in a collaborative environment.

We provided operations security training in support of the National Defense Strategy.

To ensure the workforce was practicing good Operations Security (OPSEC) during the pandemic, the Secretary of Defense (SECDEF) made our OPSEC course mandatory for all DOD employees, which quickly expanded to become an OPSEC Campaign comprised of four courses with an introductory SECDEF video.

CDSE recorded 3,957,016 total course completions for the OPSEC Campaign by the end of fiscal year 2020.

We provided training support for the development of countermeasures against COVID-19.

As part of the Operation Warp Speed (OWS) Program, we developed the "Operation Warp Speed and Beyond" toolkit and "Insider Risk Programs for the Healthcare and Public Health Sectors" job aid.

We supported the National Counter Intelligence and Security Center's (NCSC) annual National Supply Chain Integrity Month this past April by developing two webinars, a poster, a security awareness newsletter, and an updated toolkit.

We brought together civilian and military security professionals from across the globe.

We pivoted the in-person DOD Security Conference in June to 100% virtual with the theme "A Vision of Security for the Future." There were 2,700 security professionals in attendance from over 39 different agencies and services across 18 countries.

We adapted our offerings to ensure student success.

We created a conditional way forward for the National Industrial Security Policy Oversight Course (NISPOC), developing an interim mock ride-along model to replace the in-person ride alongs to facilities. This model allows field office chiefs to certify that an Industrial Security Representative (IS Rep) is ready to perform at the full performance level in the field and successfully graduate.

We sustained our relationships with our stakeholders.

In September, we conducted the 2020 Curriculum Review Meeting (CRM) virtually. We discussed what worked, where gaps existed, and the importance of communicating available training to the workforce with our stakeholders.

We established the Government and Industry Security Training (GIST) committee, first meeting on August 26, composed of Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) representatives and industry partner representatives.

We continued to bring insider threat awareness to DOD and industry personnel.

In 2020, we built a dedicated website that provides awareness materials to build an insider threat program. We built a Case Study Library for studying analyzed accounts of real-world security activities, events, and threats to build awareness and help identify the impacts of adverse behavior on National Security.

This was our year of firsts, with our first app for iOS and Android mobile devices that expands the availability of posters, videos, security awareness games, job aids, case studies, and more. We also hosted the first Insider Threat Awareness Conference in September with 1,669 participants.

We continued to show our excellence with our accreditation.

This year, six education courses and one training course were evaluated and received graduate-level credit recommendations by the American Council on Education, an organization that mobilizes the higher education community to shape effective public policy and foster innovative, high-quality practice. Currently, CDSE has a total of 32 courses with college credit recommendations.

We submitted our Institutional Reaffirmation Self-Study Report to the Council on Occupational Education (COE), despite the pandemic limitations, and rescheduled the onsite for 2021. COE is a national accrediting agency, recognized by the U.S. Department of Education, for assuring quality and integrity standards in career and technical education.

We automated and digitized the certification program.

In 2020, we optimized the certification process available to security-cleared military, DOD civilians, and defense contractors, streamlining many of the manual tasks, or eliminating them all together, by distributing digital badges. We have issued 8,755 digital badges to SPēD certification holders.

We used innovative methods to continue to reach out to our customers.

We launched three new outreach methods including "Know Your CDSE Webinars," a monthly Security Awareness "Pulse" Newsletter, and four Public Service Announcements.

We leveraged technology every step of the way.

This year, we hosted many virtual events in our online platform to include five CDSE town halls, two new employee orientations, a NITAM conference, 16 webinars (6,065 live participants), and 15 NISPOC iterations.

We evaluated new software, an eLearning Content Controller, and solicited the participation of nine agencies. We were able to share six courses and had 90,358 course completions.

What did you say?