In August, UNLV was honored to host the 2024 MSIPP CONCISE Annual Technical Symposium. The Consortium on National Critical Infrastructure Security (CONCISE) is a consortium of four Minority Serving Institutions (MSI) that includes UNLV, the University of Texas San Antonio (UTSA), North Carolina A&T (NCAT) and Savannah State University (SSU). The project is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)/National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Minority Serving Institution Partnership (MSIPP) grant with goals to:

• Facilitate AI, blockchain cybersecurity, and improve hardware security in national critical infrastructure.
• Partner with Sandia National Laboratory (SNL), Idaho National Laboratory (INL), and Nevada National Security Sites (NNSS).
• Create a sustainable workforce pipeline between the four universities with (at least) three U.S. DOE/NNSA national laboratories.

Each year participating CONCISE institutions, students and lab representatives meet to present research and discuss the project’s progress. This year students attending the symposium heard directly from national lab mentors and took part in an interactive workshop focused on developing their soft skills to find and secure professional positions.

In the afternoon, the EC-Council assisted with five rigorous Capture the Flag competitions in four hours that covered Network Service Exploitation, Hacking Cryptography, Threat Hunting, Reverse Engineering, and more. The top three winners received scholarships to Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) Certification bundles.

We look forward to continuing our work over the next year and catching up with everyone again in person in 2025!