Mr. Jerome O. Garcia, a technical staff member of the International Affairs Office and an instructor at the Department of Information Technology at Central Luzon State University (CLSU), completed his Master of Science in Cybersecurity Program at Universiti Teknologi Brunei (UTB) last June 2025.
Mr. Garcia completed his program as a full scholar of the ASEAN Cyber Shield Scholarship for ASEAN students, funded by the ASEAN-Korea Cooperation Fund.
During the Program Appreciation Night, which celebrated the achievements of the first cohort of the program, he had the honor of presenting the batch token, featuring the group photo of the completers, to Datin Paduka Professor Dr. Dayang Hajah Zohrah Haji Sulaiman, the Vice-Chancellor of UTB. Also in attendance was the Philippine Ambassador to Brunei, Her Excellency Ambassador Marian Jocelyn R. Tirol-Ignacio.
He was part of the first cohort of 10 students from Myanmar, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei Darussalam, and he is the only Filipino graduate student in his batch.
Aside from his multicultural exposure, his graduate education experience gave him opportunity to attend the Brunei Cybersecurity Conference 2024 and rub elbows with the well-known cybersecurity experts from the academe and the industry, visit multinational corporations in the sultanate to learn about their cybersecurity initiatives, and a personal visit to the Istana Nurul Iman, the official residence of the Sultan of Brunei.