Cybersecurity training center’s $3.6M project to upskill Maryland community college students 

Maryland is in the throes of a cybersecurity workforce shortage. But a training center with headquarters near Baltimore is trying to build up personnel in the region. 

BCR Cyber, based in Halethorpe, partnered with the Maryland Association of Community Colleges to provide technology and to train students in cybersecurity. It’s a roughly $3.6 million endeavor to roll out programming in all of Maryland’s 16 community colleges in the spring of 2025. 

The Maryland Department of Commerce awarded the partnership $935,680, and Maryland’s  US Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen secured $2 million in the fiscal year 2025 budget for the plan. Three colleges in western Maryland also received $617,400 from the state-founded, regionally oriented Senator George C. Edwards Fund to build out cybersecurity workforce training. 

BCR Cyber has already been doing this work: It’s trained about 1,000 students over the last five years using technology — what it calls “cyber ranges” — inspired by the Israel Defense Force but developed by a private Israeli company. An overwhelming number of trainees are now working full-time in cybersecurity, according to leadership.

“Due to its success, the state came back to us and said: ‘Is there anything else we can do?’” explained Bruce Spector, BCR Cyber’s cofounder and chairman. 

The history of BCR Cyber

Bruce accompanied the Commerce Department and former Gov. Larry Hogan in 2016 on an economic trade mission to Israel. There, he discovered a unique system as to how the government deals with threats — a cyber range. 

It’s like a flight simulator, noted Michael Spector, BCR Cyber’s president and Bruce’s son. It simulates an attack on a copied company’s server, where teams can then figure out how to mitigate and eliminate risk. 

“The real benefit of the range is that ultimately, after this attack is performed, you push a button — it’s a little bit more complex than that — and it resets back to its original settings,” Michael said. “So essentially, there is no risk to the actual company’s network.”

There have been several iterations of the range BCR Cyber uses, Michael explained. For the first generation, “we actually worked with the Israeli government and the state of Maryland” to procure the system, Bruce said. The team at BCR Cyber quickly learned the technology was too complex to teach people and too expensive to maintain. It was valued at millions of dollars, Michael noted, compared to the current $300,000 to $400,000 cost.

The current range, which is the third created solely by BCR Cyber, is a pared-down version and more straightforward than what is used in Israel. The simplicity makes it ideal for workforce development, per Michael. It and the previous version do not have any Israeli content, Bruce said. 

The BCR Cyber team has visited Israel several times in the past to research cyber ranges. Michael and Bruce said it hasn’t done so since the Oct. 7 attacks that spurred Israel’s bombardment of Gaza — a development that put a renewed spotlight on the connections between the United States and Israel’s military and private tech pipelines.

Bruce said BCR Cyber has been working “very closely” with the Maryland/Israel Development Center (MIDC), a public-private organization that promotes trade and economic development between the two entities. BCR Cyber is a member of the center, but Bruce didn’t offer more details about the work with the MIDC, which has previously assisted Israeli tech companies trying to enter the US market.

Michael said he travels around the world for his work, including his recent trip to London with the Maryland Department of Commerce for the InfoSec World cybersecurity conference. 

“The Israelis were at the forefront of this technology,” Michael said. “The range that they utilize is incredibly advanced. It’s very sophisticated.” 

How the training works 

BCR Cyber works with a consortium of 25 companies, including government contractors like Northrop Grumman and Booz Allen Hamilton, to assess cybersecurity needs, Bruce explained. The training center also works with those companies to get students placed in full-time work. Previously, potential employers watched students work and mitigate threats to see if they were a right fit, per Bruce. 

For this new partnership, each community college will have specified classrooms with workstations, Michael said. Desks will be arranged so everyone can see one another and collaborate, which will simulate an actual security team. 

The training is open to credit and non-credit students at the community colleges. 

Before getting into the specific cybersecurity training, BCR offers classes and certifications in IT basics like CompTIA A+. A base knowledge of different technologies is necessary, Bruce said. 

“Cybersecurity is an esoteric subset of IT,” he explained. “It’s kind of like the analogy to medicine: Cardiology is the specialty, but you need to be a doctor before you’re a cardiologist.”

The aim is to make the training as approachable and manageable as possible. Each community college’s cyber range will reside at BCR Cyber’s offices to alleviate the need for multiple IT teams, Bruce said.

Bruce said that this new program is intended to be self-sustaining. The money already granted will last a year or two, with the expectation that more funds will come from additional grants and from private employers needing this cybersecurity talent. 

There’s a glaring gap in the cybersecurity workforce, Bruce and Michael noted. Only 33% of the employment demand in cybersecurity is being met, according to a recent study by the State of Maryland-created economic growth group and investor TEDCO. 

This void isn’t unique to Maryland, per Michael, and the ultimate goal is to scale this program nationwide. 

“We know there are other states,” Michael said, “that can utilize this and definitely benefit from it.”