Academy students are working to make the virtual world safer, one computer at a time. And they’re doing this through a national cybersecurity competition.

The CyberPatriot competition tests participants on various coding and computing skills. These skills include ensuring that computers have strong password policies, that updates are scheduled regularly and that they do not contain files with malware and viruses.

Last school year, one of the Academy’s two CyberPatriot teams–both known as the CyberLancers–took second in the state of Hawaii in the gold tier. The team continues celebrating into the new year, after receiving its award in late August.

“It was great to not only represent our school but also to meet and talk with our fellow competitors and their mentors,” CyberLancer member and senior Shailyn Wilson said.

This is not the first victory for the CyberLancers.

“We’ve been pretty consistently second in the gold,” adviser and Academy math teacher Mrs. Deborah Kula said. “The team this year is really shooting to be in the platinum tier.”

CyberPatriot competitors compete in one of three tiers: gold, silver and platinum. Teams are able to advance through the tiers with increasing skill level.

The win has sparked new interest in the CyberLancers.

“For the past couple of years, we’ve had two teams; one of them has been gold and the other silver,” Kula said. “This year, there’s enough interest that we’re going to have four teams.”