Badges

Capella U Issues Digital Badges to Students in NSA Focus Area Programs

• By Leila Meyer
• 04/07/16

Capella University now offers digital badges for students in its National Security Agency (NSA) and Department of Homeland Security designated master's degree programs.

The for-profit, online university has partnered with Pearson to use the company's Acclaim digital badging platform to offer NSA Focus Area digital badges to students completing master's degrees in select information technology specializations.

Acclaim's digital badges give students another way of validating and sharing their academic achievements with potential employers. They can post their digital badges on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, in email or elsewhere online. When somebody clicks on the badge, they can see who earned the credential, what the student accomplished and what organization issued the badge.

"While transcripts and diplomas are long-standing, trusted validations of student achievement, digital badges provide employers with more detailed, transparent aggregations of a student's earned skills," said Peter Janzow, senior director of business development for Pearson's Acclaim digital badging platform, in a prepared statement.

Capella University students can earn NSA Focus Area badges in the following areas:

• Digital Forensics;
• Security Incident Analysis & Response;
• Network Security Administration;
• Network Security Engineering; and
• System Security Engineering.

Capella University has been designated by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Department of Homeland Security as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance/Cyber Defense for the 2014 - 2021 academic years, according to information on the university's site. This designation enables Capella "to offer NSA Focus Area digital badges to students completing its master's in information assurance and security, network defense and digital forensic specializations."