It sounds cliché that networking pays off, but talk to Adam Brogdon and see how it landed him in South Korea. Brogdon is a senior at Penn State Altoona, graduating in December with a B.S. in Security and Risk Analysis (SRA). He’s also president of the Cyber Security Club. Brogdon started out as a psychology major, but after a break from school, decided it wasn't the right major for him. He jumped back into school as an SRA major and took advantage of the many opportunities offered by his professors and through the club.
Brogdon joined a team to compete in the Grimm HAX Competition, a company-sponsored competition to solve cyber-security challenges. At the same time, Grimm was sponsoring five interns from South Korea to visit Penn State Altoona. Brogdon worked with the interns and showed them around the area. Because of his work with HAX and with the support of the interns and his professors, Brogdon was offered an internship with Grimm and was invited to present at the ICSSA conference in South Korea. Dr. Jungwoo Ryoo, head of the Division of Business, Engineering, and Information Sciences and Technology at Penn State Altoona, traveled with Brogdon to the conference, where he presented his proposal, "Capture The Flag Competition." While at the conference, Brogdon met and networked with an Austrian team who was also presenting. Not only will Brogdon's "Capture The Flag Competition" be moved forward, but he will join forces with his new Austrian friends to further develop it for real life competition.
And it doesn’t stop there! Brogdon received an offer to attend gradudate school at Stoneybrook University’s campus in Incheon, South Korean, starting in January, to earn his master's degree in Computer Science.
While Brogdon completes his undergraduate students at Penn State Altoona, he is leaving a big footprint. He has restructured the SRA Club into the Cyber Security Club, having weekly club meetings during Tuesday’s common hour in the SRA lounge located at 212 Penn Building, as well as Thursday night JAMs which are tutorial courses on new programs. He has also stepped up the team preparing for the Grimm Hackathon and added a weekend lock-in competition called the CCDC in March. For more information about the Cyber Security Club or any of the additional competitions and JAM sessions, email Adam at [email protected].
