The Cyber Navigator Internship Program, led by the University of Virginia (UVA), offers paid summer internships with election offices across the state for 39 students from Virginia universities.
The 2024 class of internships wrapped up this month, but some students will return in the fall to assist with the influx of voters. In 2020, 75 percent of Virginia’s nearly 6 million voters turned out, compared to 55 percent, 49 percent and 41 percent in 2021, 2022 and 2023 respectively.
“Our elections are critical infrastructure,” Jack Davidson, director UVA’s Cyber Defense Program, said. “A lot of these localities don't have a lot of funding. They're small. There’s one person that's doing it.”
Davidson played a key role in getting the internship program off the ground in 2021. When he came aboard in the early stages, a team was reviewing cyber navigator programs in other states like Florida and Illinois. In those programs, the state hires consultants to assist with elections. Team members wanted to enlist students rather than working professionals and initially considered making the internships free.
Davidson, who said working each summer in college was essential for him, pushed for paid internships.
“If we're going to really make this work and get an inclusive, diverse set of students involved in this, we need to be able to pay them,” he said. Here, the Virginia program set itself apart in a second way: Officials found funding through a National Security Agency (NSA) grant, rather than through the state. These grants are only available to schools deemed centers of academic excellence.
The universities involved with the program — UVA, James Madison University, George Mason University, Norfolk State University, Old Dominion University, Virginia Commonwealth University and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University — are all National Centers of Academic Excellence (NCAE) in cybersecurity. The distinction, issued by the NSA, doesn’t come with funding on its own, but schools that earn the honor can compete for exclusive grants.
Davidson said the $3 million grant they received from NCAE aligned perfectly with the Cyber Navigator program goals. The grant was for two years, with the option of a third year at NCAE’s discretion, which in this case it granted.
Each year, the internship program works with the Virginia Department of Elections to determine which local election offices need interns. Then, students interested in the program take an elective course called "Cybersecurity and Elections." In it, they learn how elections are run, the history of elections in the United States including historical voter suppression tactics, and what makes election cybersecurity unique, Davidson said.
Students who do well in the course are given priority for the internship positions, and there are more slots in the class than internships available. In 2021 and 2022, there were about 35 internship positions each year; this year, there were 39, Davidson said, noting while the compensation is not the same as students might get working for a private company, the competition “made it a little selective, which I think it makes it more enticing.”
Once the students start working, their responsibilities vary based on their locality’s needs. Students often begin by comparing their locality’s operations with federally issued election security standards.
One standard federal requirement is an incident response plan, which serves as a comprehensive guide in the event of a major cybersecurity issue. In addition to providing guidance on fixing the issue, it includes how to report it to election authorities and to the public. The standards also require a business impact plan, which explores how elections impact a locality’s economy.
Student interns have helped create or improve incident response plans, and have researched and procured virtual private networks to protect data, and two-factor authentication methods. This year, in addition to preventative work, interns in some counties got to assist with primary elections. Should local election authorities encounter something they can't handle, Davidson said the Virginia Department of Elections has a security expert on hand.
One goal of the program is to encourage students to pursue careers in public service, where there is a shortage of skilled workers. Some of the interns have done just that. One got a job at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Davidson said, and others went to work at the same election locality with which they interned.
The NCAE grant funding ends this year, but Davidson said the schools are searching for alternative funding to keep the program going. Officials are also compiling information about the program, and working with other states to help them launch similar initiatives, and expand the model to other areas of public service.
“You just can't do it if you don't have that dedicated government partner, and that would be true if you were doing some other sector — health care or whatever — this model could work,” he said.
