CyberCorps talent pipeline buckles under Trump hiring freezes

Every January, an exclusive career fair in Washington, D.C. marks a pivotal moment for CyberCorps scholars. Hundreds of top students from across the country meet with dozens of federal agencies looking to hire talent at the event, which is required attendance for recipients. 

Established in 2000, the CyberCorps: Scholarship for Service program provides college tuition and a stipend to awardees, who, in return, commit to working in a government cybersecurity role upon graduation. It’s backed by the Office of Personnel Management and National Science Foundation, the latter of which awards scholarships for up to three years of support for cybersecurity undergraduate and graduate participants, including PhD candidates.

The program has long been deemed a reliable pathway for cream-of-the-crop students to enter public service, namely those with the technical and policy chops who want to serve the nation through cyber means.

But an email issued in August of this year painted a different picture. Campus program heads were told that the upcoming annual career fair was cancelled, according to a copy viewed by Nextgov/FCW. Program events have now been made virtual for this year, though many of those have been fully cancelled, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

What unfolded is symptomatic of a larger problem: As the Trump administration has moved to shrink and restructure the federal workforce, the effects have spilled into one of the government’s few longstanding cyber talent pipelines.

For the last 20 years, the CyberCorps program has placed students into offices at several agencies and the Defense Department, including within the National Security Agency, Department of Energy and dozens of state, local, tribal and territorial governments, according to a 2023 biennial report.

As cyber activity from U.S. adversaries and criminal hackers escalates, CyberCorps recruits hoped they would be spared from vast federal workforce changes carried out over the course of this year. 

Instead, the opposite happened. Beginning as early as February, program recruits received cancellation notices for work offers at agencies like NASA, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Defense Contract Management Agency, according to nearly a dozen emails viewed by Nextgov/FCW.

What’s worse for many students is the anticipation of crushing debt. Scholarship terms stipulate that graduates must secure a qualifying job approved by OPM within an 18-month window after completing their studies. If they don’t meet that deadline, their scholarship funding converts into a loan, obligating them to repay the full amount they received.

“I already have over $100k of undergrad debt. I don’t really feel keen on taking on another $150k that I hadn’t planned on and didn’t consent to,” said one student who is on track to earn an advanced cybersecurity degree from Indiana University in May 2026. 

“I still believe in protecting critical infrastructure, obviously, but I don’t want to ever work for the government again,” they said. “As an American, I’m immensely embarrassed. I feel humiliated on behalf of everyone who works in this industry.”

That CyberCorps student and two other program participants who earned or will soon earn cybersecurity degrees — one from the University of Central Florida and another from the New Jersey Institute of Technology — were granted anonymity to speak candidly about their situation and due to fear of reprisal.

OPM and the White House Office of the National Cyber Director did not return a request for comment. NSF returned an automated email saying that staff will not be responding due to the ongoing government shutdown.

ONCD under the Biden administration had kicked off a mass effort to bolster the U.S. cyber workforce by touring schools and meeting with officials to build incentive structures that would get more students into cybersecurity jobs. “Scale nationwide” was the goal, former National Cyber Director Harry Coker told Nextgov/FCW last year during a school tour in Nevada.

Sean Cairncross, the first national cyber director under President Donald Trump, has echoed that premise. 

“We need a pipeline that develops and shares talent,” he said in September. “It should be pragmatic and accessible, reconciling and taking advantage of existing avenues within academia, vocational schools, corporations and venture capital opportunities to not only educate and train our existing cyber workforce, but to also recruit new talent, preparing the next generation to design and deploy exquisite emerging technologies.”

But CyberCorps students across the political spectrum feel they have been forgotten. They had mentors in agencies like the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, where, over multiple semesters, they held internships and planted seeds for full-time recruitment. Those mentors and managers have since been terminated or taken other offers that incentivize them to leave government service.

“I care about protecting my drinking water, about making sure the power stays on for my nieces and my nephews and my neighbors. And that’s what I was doing with [my CISA internship],” the NJIT student said. He left behind a 10-year-long corporate career and went back to school because he wanted to serve his country. Military enlistment wasn’t an option for him because of health conditions.

“The terms of the agreement changed,” he added. “But this isn’t a loan. This was a scholarship that we worked hard to get.”

The University of Central Florida student, whose capstone project focused on ransomware victimization, was supposed to go back to DHS earlier this year, but that opportunity was cancelled in February. 

“We’re getting massacred out there. I don’t really understand why we’re cutting cybersecurity at a moment when we need it most,” she said.

Over the last several months, some 250 CyberCorps scholars have been privately organizing, concerned that the current U.S. government job environment will affect their prospects for federal employment. Many have sought legal assistance to break the conditions of their scholarship and have contacted their representatives on Capitol Hill for additional help, all three students said.

“The cybersecurity of our nation is in peril and we’re turning our backs on hundreds, if not thousands, of some of the smartest cybersecurity talent our universities are creating,” an organizer memo obtained by Nextgov/FCW says. “This is a potential counterintelligence nightmare, in addition to a failing of our critical infrastructure, cybersecurity readiness plans and basic national security.”

Cuts to cyber shops across government early in the year left many CyberCorps students worried about their future prospects. More recently, cyber staff and others in DHS have faced a mass shift focused on Trump era immigration and deportation work, further narrowing hiring possibilities.

Multiple people facing potential debt burdens from the hiring reversals have written to NSF directly requesting a reprieve. 

“Due to my personal life situation and current macroeconomic factors, I am experiencing severe financial and economic burden, which significantly impacts my ability to fulfill this obligation,” one letter sent to NSF reads. Nextgov/FCW is withholding other details to protect the identity of the affected CyberCorps student.

Recruitment options are severely limited. And when CyberCorps scholars see a possible job opportunity, many feel morally obligated to share it with each other, though it simultaneously makes the playing field more competitive. 

“Any time someone finds a job that we could qualify for, we send it to everyone, and we all apply. So it’s kind of a f***ed up Hunger Games,” the Indiana student said.

After acceptance to the program, which involves a lengthy application requiring multiple recommendation letters, students must engage with an on-campus professor. Those instructors, known as principal investigators, are responsible for administering scholarships and serving as the primary point of contact with OPM. 

The setback for program participants has a dangerous trickle-down effect for those professors involved in campus recruitment, a former White House official told Nextgov/FCW. As scholarship students struggle to find jobs after completing their studies, word spreads across campuses, and those professors, who must nominate participants, may become reluctant to do so if they see high risk of poor outcomes for their nominees.

“They didn’t just get the scholarship for whatever reason, they got it because they had the recommendation of the professors,” said the former official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to fear of retribution from the Trump administration. “This is a very competitive program, and right now, we might lose this talent. But the long-term implication is that we might not be able to attract the best talent in the world in the future.”

For now, several students are trying to get 12-month extensions on their scholarship obligations, though the outlook for federal hiring conditions a year from now is unclear. Many have considered military service or continuing education, both of which would either defer their commitment to federal service or, if the role is approved, fulfill the program’s requirements and postpone or potentially avoid incurring the scholarship as debt, the students said.

Others have considered more adverse options, which would involve seeking higher-paying private sector jobs with the expectation of paying down a hefty scholarship-converted loan. State and local government placements are possible, but recent funding conditions make those opportunities scarce.

“The effect of these hiring freezes on CyberCorps scholarship recipients, whose talent is urgently needed to protect our nation’s infrastructure and whose scholarships depend on federal placement after graduation, is another example of the administration prioritizing political theatre over national security,” Rep. James Walkinshaw, D-Va., told Nextgov/FCW in an email.

“CyberCorps scholars answered a call to serve. Saddling them with debt and uncertainty does not make government more efficient, it makes our nation less safe. The administration should ensure these professionals are placed in federal roles that fulfill their service requirements, or grant extensions or exceptions so they are not unfairly penalized,” he added.

A July email sent from the program administrators in OPM to CyberCorps scholars lists various pieces of advice to navigate the new job landscape and suggested students “get creative” in their search. It advises them to look for more state and local opportunities and connect with their institution’s career services offices, among other things.

It also reminds students that government contractor positions do not count toward their scholarship obligations. 

“While you may work with a non-qualifying agency to take care of yourself and family in the interim, this will not count towards your service obligation,” it says. “Thank you for your patience, understanding and dedication during this time,” it later adds.