Students

Cora Sula, a third-year PhD student in the Department of Information Sciences and Technology at George Mason University, has been awarded a prestigious Fulbright scholarship to study artificial intelligence in classrooms in Estonia this fall.

In May 2026, Duong Thuy Nguyen is graduating with a 4.0 GPA, an Academic Excellence Award from her department, and a Capstone team leadership under her belt. In the fall, she’ll be back as a graduate student in George Mason’s accelerated bachelor’s-to-master’s program.

A cybersecurity major and long-distance runner, Simeon Omorodion found the same logic threading through both pursuits: structure, persistence, and a tolerance for discomfort that eventually becomes growth.

Mason Competitive Cyber teamwon first place at the ninth annual Commonwealth Cyber Fusion and Virginia Cyber Cup. The high‑intensity, four‑hour capture‑the‑flag competition showcased their skill, teamwork, and growing leadership in Virginia’s cybersecurity community.

Funded by a $3.9 million grant, the Scholarship for Service program supports students who commit to working in government cybersecurity roles after graduation.

George Mason graduate student Kevin Landry turned his passion for honeypots into a hands-on classroom project, leading his team to build a customized cyber trap that attracted real-world attackers and gave students an eye-opening look at cloud security.

A multi-major team from George Mason University’s College of Engineering and Computing earned second place at Saucethon, a hardware-focused hackathon, gaining online attention for their creative cat-themed rescue robot and showcasing George Mason’s collaborative, interdisciplinary strength.

Monika Blakely has lived all over the world, but her time at George Mason University has been particularly special.

The Virginia Cyber Navigator Internship Program (VA-CNIP) has equipped students with the skills to strengthen the cybersecurity posture of election infrastructures. As an intern last summer, information technology major Duong Thuy Nguyen helped secure a rural county’s technology for the upcoming presidential election alongside two George Mason peers. 

On March 21, 2024, Break Through Tech Mason hosted "A Day in the Life: Tech Jobs Unveiled," a panel event featuring Jamie Bowers, Site Reliability Engineer at Microsoft; Veeraj Modi, Security Analyst at Microsoft; and Cassandra Rothrauff, Senior Computer Engineer at Booz Allen Hamilton. Each panelist discussed their path in the tech industry as well as advice they would offer students just starting out.