"We need to see ahead" - Dept. of Homeland Security

The government is aware of the enormous need for people that can help analyze large amount of data and extract information. Yes, you read that correctly -- even the U.S. government is aware of the problem! That is how bad the problem has become.

Janet Napolitano spoke at MIT recently, noting that U.S. Intelligence sifts through more digital information than is contained in the Library of Congress' collection of printed texts. She stated,

"It's about discovering meaning and information from millions and billions of data points. ... We therefore can't overstate the need for software engineers, and information systems engineers.... And we need that kind of talent working together to find new and faster ways to identify and separate relevant data from non-relevant data."

I cannot express how refreshing it is to have someone in government speak about the data and information crisis that we are already in the middle of.  I applaud her efforts to start reaching out to the academic community.

As noted in the article, the Dept. of Homeland Security is making a renewed effort to support the research of young scholars in academia whose research is relevant to the country's security goals. They have already started a program, giving 100 scholarships, fellowships and internships for students who pursue research projects that can help them out.

Excellent.