In Black America; Cybersecurity 1, with Ida Byrd Hill

From the University of Texas at Austin, KUT Radio, this is In Black America. I reached out to Cisco initially, and it didn't respond, but I went to a conference to say to my brand conference, and ended up sitting next to a vice president there. And so I leaned over to her, say, hey, I'm trying to do A, B, and C. She said, what makes you unique? I told her we're going to put it in a library system because we wanted to be in a location where there's a bus stop. And in front of most of the libraries, there is a bus stop. We went at the four branches of Detroit Public Library System initially. We've always had virtual office hours, though, you know, we've got more students coming to the virtual office hours than we got come into the actual physical branch. So we just moved transition everything virtually. I had a bird hill, founder, and CEO of Detroit-based automation work.

In 2021, automation work was ranked as one of the nation's top cybersecurity boot camps by Career Commons. Most recently, they were named one of the best cybersecurity boot camps for 2021 by Intelligent.com, a trusted resource for online degree ranking and higher education planning. Many African-Americans work for large companies with tuition and birth for programs, but have not been able to utilize these programs as they do not have upfront funding to be reimbursed. With a new $10 million growth financing, automation work can assist many to get a nearly free education. Effectively known as the Black Effective Xavier of Cybersecurity, he was on a mission to assist 50,000 students across America to secure six certain incomes in cybersecurity, network engineering, and computer programs. I'm Johnny O'Hanson, Jr. and welcome to another edition of In Black America. On this week's program, Cybersecurity Training with Ida Bird Hill in Black America. But we did apply it on a non-profit, which was kind of exciting, just to see how that was going to develop.

But we rolled it out into a poor profit. We actually received a license from the state of Michigan, so we are a licensed school like a junior college. That's how we operate. And so as we go into each city or state, we actually get a new license to extend the reach of our school. And so that's what we've been doing. We got the $10 million to kind of expand our tuition for numbers, students that we want to add. So we're pretty aggressively going after it. But we're going to try to get bigger. So one asked me, what is our vision for the future? We want to train 100,000 students or learners. So that's a lot of students to go into train. But we figure at the University of Michigan can train 50,000 a year, we can do the same thing. In December 2017, AutomationWork Institute began at Cisco Networking Academy. AutomationWorks set out to determine if Detroiters were interested in learning high-tech career training in the Internet of Things, Network Engineering and Cybersecurity. As Cisco Networking Academy, they registered 757 students for their free classes held at 40 Joy Public Library branches.

On May 18, 2019, they celebrated their first graduating class. On May 28, 2019, AutomationWork Institute received its Michigan State License as a stand-alone post-secondary vocational school and then workforce developmental approval. Recently, Ida Bird Hill landed $10 million in growth financing to drive the expansion of a company's cybersecurity certification training across America. AutomationWork believes there are many undiscovered tech geniuses in Black America who are not earning what they are worth. Recently in Black America spoke with Ida Bird Hill. Before we start, how have you and AutomationWork navigated this COVID-19 pandemic? Well, you know, we've been virtual since 2019, but for us, it's just been business as usual. In 2017, you came up with the idea for the Cisco Networking Academy. What brought you to that decision?

Well, it was an actually interesting story. I was putting my kids through college, so I was actually riding on the bus. And a person asked me if I had a paper schedule, and I looked at him like, people still use those, and he looked at me like, yep, and pretty much I said, no, I don't use that I use Google Maps. And as I'm having this conversation with him, I'm on a very rowdy bus. It normally has about 80 people on it, because it's a major line. And all of a sudden the whole bus got quiet. So I stood up and I said, does anybody else need this lesson? And everybody on the bus raised their hand like they were in a classroom. So I went up to the front of the bus, gave me a class on how to use Google Maps to get around the city. And then as I was getting ready to leave off the bus, I said, I'm leaving in three stop. Anybody have any questions, you'd probably need to ask a forever hold your piece. A couple of people in the back had raised their hand and needed some assistance. I went into the back, helped them out, came back, scooped up my bag, and was on my way out the door. When the bus driver said, I have never seen such a thing. And after I thought about it, I hadn't either.

But I have to tell you, you know, people plant seeds, because in that January of the same year, we had done a survey for an event that we have at the North American International Auto Show. And 10 of the people had said, I needed to do a post secondary school. And I was thinking about it, but I hadn't figured out what to do with that yet. So once that happened on the bus, that was the aha moment for me to move that I really need to go ahead and put this school into play, because I could not believe that every person on that bus of 80 people got quiet to have a Google Maps instruction. And one man wants to know as a fellow Detroit, what bus line were you traveling on? That was on Grand River. Okay. Well, she knows a very happy, heavily travel line. So exact. And in the street, almost take you from downtown Detroit to almost Pontiac, if I'm not mistaken. It will, but we were getting off at the border to try to eight mile, but, but the point was that, you know, it's a rowdy bus because it cuts through the city and the population, but to have the whole bus get quiet for a lesson is like unheard of. Now, once you had that epiphany, how did you go about setting up the academy?

Well, I reached out to Cisco initially and it didn't respond, but I went to a conference, sustainable brand conference, and it ended up next to a vice president there. And so I leaned over to her say, hey, I'm trying to do a B and C. She's what makes you unique. I told we're going to put it in a library system because we wanted to be in a location where there's a bus stop. And in front of most of the libraries, there is a bus stop. So we went at the four branches of the trade public library system initially. We've always had virtual office hours. So, you know, we've got more students come to the virtual office hours than we got come into the actual physical branch. So we just moved transition everything virtually. So how did you convince the Detroit public library system to have you house your program in their facility? We had a couple of very aggressive librarians who were really aggressive in technology. And so I went to them first and then they when recruited their colleagues. Now, when a student comes to you all and they want to participate in your program, what are the steps they need to take? First of all, they've got a lot of application online, which is a very involved application. We ask a lot of questions. And then when they do that, we have them go to what we call an admission sample workshop, which is pretty much like an audition.

Some of the curriculum items that we're having, they're going through the vision section because we do look at what where people going and what goals they have and what barriers that they have. And then they can complete all of that work. They make a presentation to me. And if I decide that I feel like they fit our vibe, then we'll take them. If they don't, we don't take them, but we don't do any academic assessments, primarily because we're not really looking for somebody who is academic test smart. Somebody who's really good with their hand thus far, who are the individuals that have come to you have been successful with the program? Well, we've had a lot of women actually come to us. I would say our top salary earners are women. We have one woman who's making 117,000 and followed by another one that she at 105. But we attract a lot of mailed ironically across the board, even though the two higher earners are women. And there across multiple injuries, if some of them have been in tech support, some of them have been in logistics, getting a lot of people from the restaurant management industry.

They're very hard workers, but we really looking for somebody who has good work ethic, you know, because we do a lot of hands on simulation. And so our work is a little different than most, we don't we're not a PowerPoint lecture. You take a test type of a school. You have to work it out for us. And so we look for those type of students who have the ability to work it out, whether it's in a digital simulation, a video game or a puzzle. Now, for those who are familiar with what you do or what industry and which you assist people to get into, explain to us, what is the network engineer? Well, in this week was a good example because we have more discussion about network engineering ever in the history of life when Facebook went down on Saturday and Sunday and Monday. They tried to explain that they had a problem with a domain name service with a, and then went on to explain to people what a border gateway protocol was.

Most of them have never heard of that, but in sure what network engineers do, we keep the system running, whatever network that something's running on, we're the ones that make it run. So I say we were superheroes during the pandemic because we kept the internet running across the board, but most of them didn't even know that we existed. Now, talk to us about why is it important for you and your school and the necessity of having experts in cyber security. First of all, what cyber security specialists do, they protect the network, they protect the data going in and data going out, which is very important because everything right now, the new goal is new oil is data. That's where all of the money is being made right now. And so either you build a network or you protect the network, and that's very important because we are now all into the virtual world. We can't live without the internet. It is every present and every ounce of our lives. And so that's the first thing. Secondly, you know, because your data is the new gold or the new oil depending upon who you ask, you need lots of people to be able to protect that goal oil. And so that's what cyber security people do.

So there's a lot of jobs that are open in that industry, because you need as much protection as possible, as you see, because we're losing the cyber war, because it's just not enough body. It's not just the hackers, they're criminal, but they're smart criminal. And they're not going to stop, because they're trying to make money, particularly since they can break into an account and get more money than they ever could by robbing a bank. So it's the new crime, and so they're good at it. And they're maximizing it. So my thing, I tell people, it's an ever growing industry that is paying Google out of the money, and it doesn't require a degree. have to have a degree is work his way to goal. Now I haven't heard that phrase Google I've been a long time. I guess. I'm telling my. I'm telling my old now. Now what are some of the what are some of the areas in which cybersecurity

expert fight against some of the things that I'm trying to invade our computers? The first thing that that's really hot right now is ransomware or they hold your your data your systems have just for money big big big big business and it's happening in every industry house that'll school you know government you know large companies small companies mid-sized companies any place that there's data there's a potential to do ransomware so that's happening everywhere the second thing is that we're having people where they're just they're lurking in your computer and they're getting your data to use for a later purpose sometimes they don't break in just to get money from you they break in to get money from people that are connected to you so we're seeing a lot of activity with small and medium-sized businesses because they're trying to get the big business and that's the way to break in I burrow through a small business go to their their supplier and so on and so on and so on until I get to the main the main supplier and so you find out a lot of that that type of

activity happening I'm a consumer site where you're finding a lot of identity that is wearing people out particularly seniors because they're not as perceptive as as the details and they're taking their money so wherever it goes notice is data that they're still in to get to the money and and that's the name of the game that they're playing our company's coming to you for your expertise or are they coming to you to hire your students the many coming to me to hire my students but I tell people they that means they get a piece of my expertise every time they hire a student and and that's the the whole goal because I don't want to be the only person that's benefiting from the cyber security industry we want lots of people on one of the things that you find about the tech industry in general you don't find a lot of African-Americans in the industry and I don't know why because that's where all the jobs are and everybody's talking about they're looking for a good job and no one is going into tech because they think that we're still in a place where we're doing production and screwing on widgets and yes we do some of that but the bulk of that is now very technological so my thing is black people really need to move

fast to get into the industry because that's where the money is what is happening they're afraid to do the technology so you having said that how are you trying to get the word out to our brothers and sisters that you know this is this is the way for the future well I've been doing radio shows TV shows we've been doing press releases just we've been a little bit of everywhere we've been winning awards to give you attention but we've been having conversations but mainly I tell people you know you tell a friend you you tell a friend and they tell a friend and so on and so on and so on but we're here so a lot of people tell me well you know they're keeping us out well they're no longer keeping you out because now we're here and we cater to people of color across the country so we're getting students from everywhere what we're looking for though are those students who are ready 25 to 45 because they're a little bit more mature the hand of the course work because we do a hundred and fifty-two digital simulations and in a four-year computer science degree if you do 50 I be very surprised in four years so to do a hundred and fifty-two in a year

requires a lot of diligence and a strong work ethic okay now what is a digital simulation basically instead of just putting you out on a network it says wing it we actually show you on a simulation how to build it so your building networks on a system that is digital that's on your computer so by the time you get out to the industry to those 150 to those networks you're pretty good at what you're doing at this point if you're just joining us I'm John E. O'Hanston Jr. and you listening to in black America from KUT radio and when we speak with Ida Bird Hill founder and CEO of automation work Miss Hill how did you happen to become interested in cybersecurity well truthfully is that I was building a mobile video game because I'm a financial person and we were building a financial mobile game and I could not find any game developers in Detroit so because we're not really a gaming town so I'm applying to create my own developers but while I'm doing research on what I

should do I stumbled upon that there's gonna be 3.5 million until jobs and cybersecurity so I decided that's where we're gonna go we're gonna educate them on something that's in high demand that's everywhere so that people can always have a job because of the demand. Now how long does the process take for once one register and you accept them and they matriculate through you all's program. Our program is 12 months and at the unusual 12 months the first six months is our coursework and then they take a two month break and something a class that we call career break where we're looking for a job and hopefully they'll find one within two two and a half months and then they come back the class for the last four months. I understand you are recently saved a considerable sum of money does this assistant tuition or upgrades you are a program. Well actually we're allocating in all to tuition we are what we call an income share agreement school and what that basically says you come to us you give us

$100 and then we front the tuition for you when you graduate and or get a job whichever one happens first you start to pay us back over 48 months if you don't get a job or a certain threshold then we don't we wave the tuition. Now speaking of jobs who are the if you can tell her who are the companies that your students are currently or will be working for. Well we have a couple people are Deloitte and Tush which is one of the large accounting firms there are a lot of cybersecurity for the federal and federal practice. We have a couple people are intentional we have some people at logic callus we had a person at Cala which is the city area forward. So we're getting people jobs in very unusual spaces but where the demand is. Now it's a national program so are there any particular regions of the country in which you are receiving students more than than the other or most of my entity chart area. We do have students in the

trade area but we do have students in the land to Baltimore and Philadelphia but our plan is to get across the country we just had a few students register from Dallas so pretty excited about that. We want to be wherever there are people and particularly African-American people so we're looking aiming at 20 of the top major cities and they're surrounding metros but we're open because we're virtual anyone can come to us. You have internet and a computer you can potentially be a learner for us. Obviously the company has grown since its inception in 2017. Can you give us an idea of the steps that have taken place over the years? Well we did apply it on a nine profit which was kind of exciting just to see how that was going to develop but we wrote it out into a four profit. We actually received a license from the state of Michigan so we are a licensed school like a junior college and that's how we operate and so as we go into each city or state we actually get a new license to extend the reach of our school and so that's what we've been doing. We got the $10 million to kind of expand our tuition for

number students that we want to add so we're pretty aggressively going after it but we're going to try to get bigger. So when asked me what is our vision for the future we want to train a hundred thousand student learners so that's a lot of students to go into train but we figure if the University of Michigan can train 50,000 a year we can do the same thing. Other than obviously the end goal is it's to make money but why is it important to you to assist particularly African-Americans to to participate in this new horizon? McKenzie and company in 2017 right about the time that we did the school had did a report that 60% of African-American jobs will be gone by 2030. When I saw that that's right that's it I got to get busy because what happens is that if you have no job you have no housing you have no car you don't have a whole bunch of things but what you will end up having is mass poverty. Now the pandemic has fed up that timeline is probably more like 2025 as we've seen a lot of people got laid out during

the pandemic. A lot of those people are African-Americans who are probably in hospitality or some other lower-level job and so this is their opportunity to increase themselves. We're open to anyone who has a good strong work ethic and if you really decide you really want to be part of the economy and to do well in the economy you have got to be in something that's related to technology because that's an every sector but what happens we've been slow to get into the into that working side of the house we adopt the technology we're using the technology we're just not profiting and our personal lives from making money from the technology. As you as you say that and something that came to mind when a person and obviously you want older adults because they're momentary and more focused but there's unemployment going on so my question is are unemployment agencies either state or citywide considering you as an option for these individuals to get some type of training for open

mobility. Yeah I mean we do we we have a relationship with the Detroit workforce development department and we're actually trying to get those relationships across the country because we don't really work care where the student comes from or based on life they're in we just want to know that you have a work ethic that you really to do the work to make it happen when you do the work I tell people I will do the rest. I know that's right at the end of the day missail when do you realize you've had a good day. For me every day is a good day because I wake up on that side of the table every day but I get excited when I see that my my learners are having aha moments that they're making career transitions I'm seeing it there that they're making transitions in their schoolwork and that's a good day for me so every day is a good day. Ironically and unfortunately you know we're open seven days a week I don't know if that's good or bad some days but my students connect all the time because they're in a learning mode not only about schoolwork but how their schoolwork relates to the world at large and so my thing as long as

they're growing and we're seeing it replicated in their job choices and the incomes that they're making it makes a really big deal for me because that's what I'm here for so I tell people if you really you really want to to make this happen you know give us a shot but don't come to us because you think oh you know I got a sister she's gonna pass me through because that's not how that works I would say our school is probably tougher than most because there are challenges in the industry let's just put that right on the on the table likely to have not been really welcome into the technology industry it has been a young white boy system and so the way that we saw that is that if you come to the table and you tend to be a little smarter than most then people can't challenge your skills because they're gonna challenge you as a person but at the end of the day can your skills hold up to what's happening you are in the in the public library so are this computed driven or do you all have a particular spot in the library and the second part of that question are the

students that are not in Detroit how are they accessing the programs that you all are offering we are no longer in the library system we've gone a hundred percent virtual okay so you know mostly we have to have their own laptop and if they have a laptop and internet service they can access us final question miss Hill as as a resident of Detroit how is the city doing for me is done well I'm I'm not a native of Detroit but I've been here 30 years and I tell people you can't make it in Detroit you can't make it anywhere because one of the things that Detroit has is it has the first of all predominant population is 80% African-American but that also says a lot of the businesses are it's legislative processes is just is a very African-American city so I'm doing well and but there are some people who are not because they haven't figured out how to manipulate the system because beyond just having training you have to learn how to play the politics of networking in every town that you're in and so that's part of our curriculum as well as to teach

you how do you network because you just can't get training on technological stuff you have to know how do I work in a system and particularly in a corporate system that is not predominantly black it's predominantly white in Asian particularly in the technological world so I just said you know the same concept that takes to network across the town is the same time skills that takes the network across the corporation who are the individuals that assist you in what you do well you now have a chief technology officer a VP of marketing a VP of innovation and of course a VP of academics so those individuals you know keep us on track and keep us rolling so how long have those individuals been with you all of them except for one has been with us since the 2017 pilot going back to the 10 million which you all just received that you are a platform or someone look you all up and say we like what you're doing here's a chunk of change it was both you know the the way that

this this this industry runs all of us who are started up and we're trying to get funded the person who gets the most funding wins as usually hat works and so we're all networking to try to get more funding because this is set up as deck funding which is more like a loan type scenario we were not looking at the time but a couple of entities came to us which made us like you know maybe it's time for us to start looking and we did and then we this entity found out so we were pretty excited about that did you always see any of that the government money from the pandemic? I chose not to do any of the pandemic money at all and that was a personal decision on our behalf most people do not realize that most government loans require that you have to personally guarantee the loan and I'm of the mindset the whole reason why we have corporations which are the most wonderful things in America is so that my personal life is not tied up with my corporate life

so I'm not going to borrow any money and personally guarantee that money because now that means I didn't put the two back together and I'm just not going to do that I don't think I have to do that now with Silicon Valley and New York doing very creative financing I decided it for this business I'm not going to tie my life up like that so I didn't do any of that money because a lot of that money you had to be a personal guarantee and I just decided it just wasn't worth the headache at all. Once a student received their certification do you all assist in job placement? Yeah and we actually start to job placement before they get their their certification we do it in the middle and we have a class that's called career break and that's when we start looking at the jobs within the first right after the first six months of class. One final question this time for real how did you come up with the moniker or who gave you the moniker the Black Professor Xavier of Cyber Security? Actually one of my students and I don't have to laugh about that because I have a severe Marvel fan and I have been for decades

and what I've noticed is just about every single one of my students a Marvel fan. I had a bird health founder and CEO of Detroit based automation work. If you have questions, comments or suggestions ask your future in Black America programs email us at inBlackAmerica at kut.org. Also let us know what videos they can you heard us over. Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast and follow us on Facebook and Twitter. You can get previous programs online at kut.org. Also you can listen to a special collection of in Black America programs at American Archive or Public Broadcasting. Got some American archives.org. The views and opinions expressed on this program are not necessarily those of this station or of the University of Texas at Austin until we have the opportunity again for Techie Co. producer David Alvarez. I'm John L. Hanson Jr. Thank you for joining us today. Please join us again next week.

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