WASHINGTON STATE

Washington State House Democrats

HOUSE DEMOCRATS

Rep. Hudgins Announces Legislation to Educate Future Workers in Cybersecurity

Rep. Hudgins announces legislation to educate future workers in cybersecurity
Conditional loan program will encourage students to learn business-oriented programming skills

OLYMPIA – Rep. Zack Hudgins (D-Tukwila) announced today that he is introducing legislation that will address the growing needs of the state’s aging legacy technology systems through a new conditional loan program that encourages outstanding students to enter the information technology field.

“Right now, we have a smaller pool of workers to draw from with the necessary skills to manage the state’s IT projects and many new graduates lack the skills to administer our legacy systems”, said Rep. Hudgins. “By encouraging instruction in the ancient COBOL programming language, project management, and the ever-developing world of cybersecurity, we will be better able to provide stability and security of the public information technology infrastructure.”

The conditional loan program would allow for the loan to be forgiven in whole or part if the student graduates with a degree in information technology and are instructed in common business-oriented programming languages and then go on to work at a state agency directly with a legacy system.

“I think it is a better investment of public dollars to pay for some college and help our public IT systems than hire expensive out-of-state consultants to do the same thing,” said Hudgins.

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