Singapore’s Defense Industry Launches New Work-Learn Program for Cyber Specialists

July 2020

The Ministry of Defense (MINDEF) of Singapore recently inked an agreement with the National University of Singapore (NUS) to enable full-time national servicemen (NSFs) to pursue their part-time tertiary studies while being deployed in an operational role. With the new Work-Learn Program (WLP) in effect, NSFs will be able to earn academic credits by taking modules from the NUS School of Computing’s Information Security program that can be counted towards a cybersecurity degree.

This new development follows a similar collaboration between MINDEF and the Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT) started in 2018. These investments in people and training are part of MINDEF’s continual efforts to harness NS talents and strengthen cyber defense capabilities. Pre-enlistees who are interested in the Cyber Specialist Award may apply online at www.mindef.gov.sg/CyberNSF.

Underscoring the value of the WLPs in developing committed and skilled cyber NSFs, Defense Cyber Chief, Brigadier-General (BG) Mark Tan said, “Cybersecurity is a national imperative. We must recruit and train up a cyber force to defend and protect Singapore’s interests in the cyber domain. Key to this is identifying and nurturing the next generation of talents to hone their skills in Cybersecurity and deploying them on our digital borders to defend our networks and systems. We are confident that the partnership with NUS will broaden the appeal of the Cyber NSF Scheme and contribute to the Ministry of Defense (MINDEF) and the Singapore Armed Forces’ (SAF) development of a highly-skilled cyber workforce.”

(Sources: Ministry of Defense, Singapore; The Straits Times)

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