Dakota State professor awarded for cybersecurity work

MADISON, S.D. (KELO) — An associate professor at Dakota State University (DSU) in Madison is gaining extra recognition for his work in Cyber Security.

Kyle Cronin is an associate professor at DSU, with a specialty in computer science and cyber security.

“I lead a lot of initiatives that work with around just under 500 other cybersecurity universities in the country. And a lot of our initiatives are trying to do outreach to help them improve their programs. So we have better cybersecurity educators across the country. So that’s where a lot of this came from,” Cronin said.

In April, he received the 2024 Outstanding Community of Practice in Cyber Operations Service Award.

“It’s really exciting to me to be recognized by my friends in the community. There’s there’s thousands of cybersecurity faculty around the country. So for them to kind of single me out and pick me, it was really an awesome feeling,” Cronin said.

“Kyle’s really an extraordinary talent, and he’s really representative of kind of everything you’ll find here at the become an indicative state in general. You know we have a super caring faculty. We have really involved people. We have folks that are willing to reach out and deal with students and interact with anybody on a daily basis,” DSU Associate Professor Pat Engebretson said.

Cronin says the way he learned about this award makes him laugh.

“Well, one day I got an email of, hey, you, you’ve been sent this award. We want to make sure you’re going to be at the ceremony. I wasn’t actually going to be at the award designation ceremony, so I had to change my flights to make it up a little bit early,” Cronin said.

Now that the excitement has died down, Cronin plans to continue his work on DSU Cybersecurity Program.

Cronin says DSUs cybersecurity program is growing, with 1600 students enrolled.