Bipartisan House members introduced legislation to accelerate federal hiring of cybersecurity personnel by prioritizing candidates' skills over formal academic credentials. Agencies would be barred from mandating minimum educational requirements for covered cybersecurity positions unless state or local law requires them or the candidate's education directly reflects necessary competencies to perform the duties. Education would only be a determining qualification when it directly matches the competencies necessary for the position. The Office of Personnel Management would be required to publish annually any changes to minimum education qualification standards and provide aggregate data on new employees' educational backgrounds by position classification. The measure aims to expand the federal cybersecurity talent pool amid persistent shortages and an estimated roughly 470,000 vacant U.S. cybersecurity positions.
According to the bill's text, agencies would only be able to mandate minimum educational requirements for covered cyber positions if it is required by law to do so in the state or locality where the employee would be based. Education would also only be considered a determining factor "if the candidate's education directly reflects the competencies necessary to satisfy that qualification and perform the duties of the position."
The proposal would also require the Office of Personnel Management to annually publish on its website "any changes made to minimum qualifications standards concerning education for covered positions," as well as aggregate data on the educational backgrounds of new employees sorted by their position classifications. In a press release, the lawmakers said their bill "prioritizes skills-based hiring over outdated educational requirements."
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