## Instructions ``` All students will submit a 1-page (12 point font, single-spaced) reflection paper articulating how the professional development you completed improves your employability and likelihood of success in the field of Cybersecurity. ``` # Reflection ## How did the professional development I completed improve my employability and likelihood of success in the field of Cybersecurity? -- There will be some overlap with the Experience Reflection as I also cited ISSessions in my professional/personal development. --   I took this summer as an opportunity to exceed my classmates in professional/personal development; while I do not have any certifications, I took to TryHackMe to develop my skills. In the above image you can see I was touching multiple different concepts, and then I started to do some challenge rooms! I really enjoyed connecting to the VPN server and trying to find the keys hidden within the challenges. It really made me feel positive about doing these, and learning new skills in the process. I believe I can use all these skills and the future skills I will learn from TryHackMe has and will improve my employability and likelihood of success in finding a co-op job, grad job, or any other future role in cybersecurity. I am always improving my skills outside of school. I also spent a good chunk of this fall attending security conferences, like Bsides TO and SecTor, where I met **SO** many new faces and made tons of new connections. I saw classmates and younger years around these places, and it was so fantastic seeing everyone start so early, get so involved and stay connected. It really gives me pride that this is my career and what I will be working in for the foreseeable future. I believe that meeting these people and putting a face to name is really the most successful way to find a job in the future. I am still in contact with many people from SecTor, people who are looking out for roles that match my skillset. I am beyond grateful for these opportunities, and it will not stop there for me. I will continue to put myself out there even after I have landed a role in the field. I love conversing with others about tech stuff or regular person things, and connecting with these folks has always been something I have been very prideful about! I believe that this will immensely improve my likelihood of success in finding a role. I also cannot end this Reflection without touching on my role as Executive Producer for the 2024/2025 Season for ISSessions! This role has constantly demanded my personal development, as I always am required to come up with solutions on the spot for in-person streaming issues as well as monitoring the online stream and making sure all participants are able to, well, participate! I make sure the audio, visual, and in-person elements are available for all parties, no matter how they attend. We now use a webcam during the streams to further increase that personability of the team and each session. I also had to come up with a solution for splitting the processing power so that my laptop would not implode during the session (The processing power of my laptop is not the best). I opted to ask for a secondary Producer, who now helps me broadcast the stream to the internet on a different device, while I monitor all the outputs and the in-person event as well. There is an immense amount of problem solving, working with a team, and also operating at the best of my ability to produce the highest quality stream of content with the least amount of issues. Putting all of this personal and professional development together, I am confident that my likelihood of success is quite high now, and if I had the chance to have an interview, I would land the role. I am also confident that this has increased my employability exponentially, and I have more ways to answer the questions given to me by potential employers, as I have more experiences in labs and with specific skills. Instead of just saying, "Oh, well in class we did a project on xyz.", I can now say "Oh, well I performed a personal lab of mine and did abc, as well as do a professional writeup, and posted it on my website." This shows much more professional understanding of the exercise, and it shows that you know how to explain and understand what you did, not just following instructions from a professor or assignment sheet.