Cisco Systems Announces Cisco Networking Academies - 'Shop' of the 21st Century

WASHINGTON, DC - October 1, 1997 - San Jose-based Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) today announced Cisco Networking Academies, a new program to teach and certify high school and college students to design, build and maintain computer networks capable of supporting national and global organizations. Upon completing the program, graduates will have the skills necessary to fill the estimated 190,000 high-technology jobs that are currently available in U.S. corporations (Source: a 1997 study from the Information Technology Association of America entitled "Help Wanted: the IT Workforce Gap at the Dawn of a New Century").

"It's the 'shop' of the 21st Century," said Cisco Chairman John Morgridge. "It's the first true partnership between schools, government and business since the days of high school 'auto shops.' The difference is, instead of auto mechanics, students learn the conceptual and practical skills necessary to design and manage networks."

Morgridge made the announcement today at a press conference on Capitol Hill. "In this Information Age, network administrators are essential to the success of almost all businesses," he said, "yet most companies are shaking the bushes to find enough people with the right skills to address the demand."

To kick-start the program, Cisco Systems will contribute approximately $18 million in curriculum, equipment and resources to help bridge the gap. The investment has already started in 57 high schools, colleges and technical schools in seven states throughout the country - Arizona, California, Florida, Minnesota, Missouri, New York and North Carolina. In the first full year of the program, more than 1,000 students will gain the school-to-career experience they need to take immediate positions in the networking industry. By the Fall of 1998, the program is expected to be operational in all 50 states and in other countries as well.

"Access to information on the Internet is as important today as electricity and basic phone service have been in the past," said U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), co-author of the Snowe-Rockefeller Amendment to the 1996 Telecommunications Act which links schools and libraries to the Information Superhighway. "By equipping our young people with skills they'll need to compete in the next century, Cisco's Networking Academies program is helping to prepare a new generation for a new set of challenges."

Dr. Donald Ingwerson, superintendent of the Los Angeles County School District, which includes 2.8 million students, is enthusiastic about the Cisco Networking Academies starting in his school district in January 1998. Ingwerson said, "Cisco Systems has gone the extra mile in joining with Los Angeles County Schools to prepare our students to compete in the 21st Century. Through this relationship, thousands of our students will leave high school capable of entering the technical workforce."

Kids taking Cisco Networking Academies classes are just as excited about the curriculum as they are about the employment opportunities awaiting them after graduation. For Jenica Lee, a Thurgood Marshall Academic High School senior in San Francisco with tentative plans to pursue computer science in college, the interactive, project-based format of the Academy helps students develop into problem solvers. "You learn more, because you encounter problems and have to work through them to figure out the solution," Lee observed. "It's also more fun."

"The Networking Academies program is in tune with the President's initiatives on educational technology and in the best spirit of public-private partnership," said Linda Roberts, director of the Office of Educational Technology, U.S. Department of Education. "This new program will provide badly needed network support and trained students."

Businesses across the country are eager to accept the influx of skilled Cisco Networking Academies graduates. "Cisco's program is just what the doctor ordered," said Marvin Bailey, vice president, State Technology Programs at Ameritech, Inc. "The growth we've experienced requires a continual supply of skilled network professionals to keep our customers happy and our internal network up and running. We're very supportive of Cisco's new Networking Academies program and eagerly awaiting its graduates."

The Cisco Networking Academies program also addresses the need for network administrators within the schools themselves. As tens of thousands of elementary and secondary schools have become "wired" in the last few years, principals across the country have scrambled to find people to build and maintain their new networks. According to industry analysts, more than 85 percent of the Internet's backbone is comprised of Cisco hardware and software. While in the Cisco Networking Academies program, students fill their own school's networking needs and can be loaned out on projects to other school within the district. Upon graduation, students can go to work building and supporting the networks of schools in their area.

The new Cisco Networking Academies program is the latest in a series of programs from Cisco to benefit schools. Cisco was a founding member of NetDay (a national program to wire America's K-12 schools), was the first corporation to partner with the Internet2 program to define the next-generation Internet, and has supported such educational programs as International Schools CyberFair and the Virtual Schoolhouse Grant Program. For more information on Cisco's role in education, see Cisco's Education Website at www.cisco.com/edu.