College of Engineering
Doug Talbert, computer science associate chair, named interim director of CEROC
Doug Talbert, Ph.D., has been named interim director of Tennessee Tech University’s Cybersecurity Education, Research and Outreach Center.
Talbert, who joined the department of computer science at Tech in 2002 and serves as its associate chair, has several goals going into the fall semester following the departure of CEROC’s founding director, Ambareen Siraj, Ph.D., who moved on to a new role at the National Science Foundation in June.
“There are so many things in academia that when the person behind it leaves, it dies,” Talbert said. “Dr. Siraj has done a great job putting the pieces in place to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Among Talbert’s top priorities is supporting CEROC staff and associated faculty members as they strive to maintain a reputation of excellence in cybersecurity education, research and outreach on the Tennessee Tech campus and beyond.
“Clearly, this is going to be a team effort going forward,” Talbert said. “We’ve got really good people on our staff; we’ve got good faculty. I see my role as, ‘How do I help them do their job?’ and then, ‘How do I work with them to figure out how CEROC works in a post-Ambareen world?’ She was so good at all this stuff and so active, and her hand was in so many things.”
Talbert emphasized that while CEROC’s leadership has changed, its goals remain the same. Those include providing quality cybersecurity education, supplying trained students for the cybersecurity workforce, researching trending areas of cybersecurity, and increasing public awareness of information assurance and cybersecurity.
To read the full details on CEROC’s upcoming initiatives under Talbert, please visit the university newsroom article.
