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    Experiences and Lessons Learned Creating and Validating Concept Inventories for Cybersecurity

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    2004.05248.pdf (1.203Mb)
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    https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-58703-1_1
    Permanent Link
    https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58703-1_1
    http://hdl.handle.net/11603/19999
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    • UMBC Computer Science and Electrical Engineering Department
    • UMBC Education Department
    • UMBC Faculty Collection
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    Author/Creator
    Sherman, Alan T.
    Herman, Geoffrey L.
    Oliva, Linda
    Peterson, Peter A. H.
    Golaszewski, Enis
    Poulsen, Seth
    Scheponik, Travis
    Gorti, Akshita
    Date
    2020-09-09
    Type of Work
    25 pages
    Text
    book chapters preprints
    conference papers and proceedings
    Citation of Original Publication
    Sherman A.T. et al. (2021) Experiences and Lessons Learned Creating and Validating Concept Inventories for Cybersecurity. In: Choo KK.R., Morris T., Peterson G.L., Imsand E. (eds) National Cyber Summit (NCS) Research Track 2020. NCS 2020. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1271. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58703-1_1
    Rights
    This item is likely protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. Unless on a Creative Commons license, for uses protected by Copyright Law, contact the copyright holder or the author.
    Abstract
    We reflect on our ongoing journey in the educational Cybersecurity Assessment Tools (CATS) Project to create two concept inventories for cybersecurity. We identify key steps in this journey and important questions we faced. We explain the decisions we made and discuss the consequences of those decisions, highlighting what worked well and what might have gone better. The CATS Project is creating and validating two concept inventories—conceptual tests of understanding—that can be used to measure the effectiveness of various approaches to teaching and learning cybersecurity. The Cybersecurity Concept Inventory (CCI) is for students who have recently completed any first course in cybersecurity; the Cybersecurity Curriculum Assessment (CCA) is for students who have recently completed an undergraduate major or track in cybersecurity. Each assessment tool comprises 25 multiple-choice questions (MCQs) of various difficulties that target the same five core concepts, but the CCA assumes greater technical background. Key steps include defining project scope, identifying the core concepts, uncovering student misconceptions, creating scenarios, drafting question stems, developing distractor answer choices, generating educational materials, performing expert reviews, recruiting student subjects, organizing workshops, building community acceptance, forming a team and nurturing collaboration, adopting tools, and obtaining and using funding. Creating effective MCQs is difficult and time-consuming, and cybersecurity presents special challenges. Because cybersecurity issues are often subtle, where the adversarial model and details matter greatly, it is challenging to construct MCQs for which there is exactly one best but non-obvious answer. We hope that our experiences and lessons learned may help others create more effective concept inventories and assessments in STEM.


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    Albin O. Kuhn Library & Gallery
    University of Maryland, Baltimore County
    1000 Hilltop Circle
    Baltimore, MD 21250
    www.umbc.edu/scholarworks

    Contact information:
    Email: scholarworks-group@umbc.edu
    Phone: 410-455-3021


    If you wish to submit a copyright complaint or withdrawal request, please email mdsoar-help@umd.edu.