By Capt Lawrence Coyne
Local Civil Air Patrol squadron builds the next generation of cyber defenders
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
HILLSBOROUGH, NJ — While some teenagers are content to spend their spare time goofing off playing video games, one group of young cadets was doing something different.
Fifthteen (15) cadets from the Raritan Valley Composite Squadron, local unit of the Civil Air Patrol (CAP), are competing in CyberPatriot, the premier national high school cyber defense competition that challenges students to defend a simulated corporate network from external hostile attacks.
More than just a competition, CyberPatriot provides students with hands-on learning and introduces many young people to the idea of cybersecurity as a profession. It is designed to educate and motivate students to become the cyber defenders the nation needs while promoting Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) studies.
After training every Saturday for six months with a dedicated group of volunteers from the industry, the squadron hosted three teams consisting of five cadets each. In addition, a fourth team of Middle School-aged cadets participated in a new pilot program this year.
The fifthteen (15) cadets from the Raritan Valley Composite Squadron:
Cadet/Senior Airman Pranav Bhojraj
Cadet/Airman 1st Class Alexander Case
Cadet/Chief Master Sargeant James Case
Cadet/Tech Sargeant Jordan Daley
Cadet/Chief Master Sargeant Vedanta Dhobley
Cadet/Airman 1st Class Garrett Leung
Cadet/Tech Sargeant Aditi Panvelkar
Cadet/Senior Airman Heli Patel
Cadet/2nd Lieutenant Vatsal Patel
Cadet/Master Sargeant Neehar Polavarapu
Cadet/Senior Airman Akil Ponnambalam
Cadet/Airman 1st Class Vignesh Prassad
Cadet/Master Sargeant Aravind Ramakrishnan
Cadet/Senior Airman Alexander Shu
Cadet/Senior Airman Trevor Shu
The two Middle School cadets are:
Cadet/Airman 1st Class Alonzo
Cadet/Senior Master Sargeant Joseph Kronmaier
The first segment of the competition lasted six consecutive hours. All of the teams had execllent scores, with one of the teams making the top 100 in the country for the All Service Division.
A group of dedicated volunteer coaches and mentors have spent an exceptional amount of time creating training modules, preparing lessons, and helping each cadet through every step of the way.
The Raritan Valley Composite Squadron was fortunate to have the privilege of using the Raritan Valley Community College’s computer labs.
According to squadron Commander, Lieutenant Colonel Amy Myzie, “This was the sixth year that the Raritan Valley Composite Squadron participated in this competition and all of the teams performed very well.” Lieutenant Colonel Myzie added “our cadets were very grateful for the high speed internet and the state of art equipment that were made available by the folks at the college.” She stated “The cadets are eagerly looking forward to the next segment of the competition which begins in three weeks.”
More information on CyberPatriot is available at www.uscyberpatriot.org or email [email protected]. The Raritan Valley Composite Squadron meets on Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m. at the Central Jersey Regional Airport in Hillsborough, NJ. You may aso contact the squadron by visiting http://raritanvalley.njwg.cap.gov.
Civil Air Patrol, the official Air Force auxiliary, is a nonprofit organization with almost 62,000 members nationwide. CAP performs 95% of continental U.S. inland search and rescue missions as tasked by the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center. Its volunteers also perform homeland security, disaster relief and counter-drug missions at the request of federal, state and local agencies. The members take a leading role in aerospace education and serve as mentors to the almost 27,000 young people, ages 12 to 21, currently participating in CAP cadet programs. CAP has been performing missions for America for more than 70 years.
More information on the Civil Air Patrol is available at the national website (http://gocivilairpatrol.com), the New Jersey website (http://njwg.cap.gov) or by contacting Lawrence Coyne, Public Affairs Officer for the Raritan Valley Composite Squadron by email at [email protected].

