Consortium of Cybersecurity Clinics

**The Consortium** **Founded in May 2021, the Consortium of Cybersecurity Clinics serves as a forum for clinicians, trainers, students, and advocates to share knowledge, expand the reach of cybersecurity clinics, and lower the barriers for other institutions to establish their own clinics.** **Breaking Ground** Before the official launch of the Consortium, several member universities already had the basis for a clinic program. The University of California, Berkeley’s [Citizen Clinic](https://cltc.berkeley.edu/about-us/citizen-clinic/) launched in 2018 with a focus on defending nonprofits at risk of politically motivated cyber attack. In 2019, [Indiana University launched a clinic](https://cyberrisk.iu.edu/career-prep/cyberclinic.html) to address the needs of state and local agencies, and [MIT launched a clinic](http://urbancyberdefense.mit.edu/cybersecurityclinic) focused on supporting small towns and municipalities in New England, inspired in part by national news of municipalities facing devastating ransomware attacks. In 2021, UC Berkeley teamed up with MIT, Indiana University, and the University of Alabama to assess interest in a forum for cybersecurity clinic leaders and coordinators to share knowledge. They were quickly joined by the University of Georgia, Athens, the Rochester Institute of Technology, and allied organizations R Street Institute and the Global Cyber Alliance, and the idea for the Consortium of Cybersecurity Clinics was born. Since then, we’ve joined forces with university-based cybersecurity clinics operating around the nation, and the cybersecurity clinic model has steadily taken hold at colleges and universities in the United States and abroad.