My honest experience with OCCIC (A warning for students)
I got into OCCIC two semesters ago because the faculty kept throwing around buzzwords like "hands-on experience" and "internship opportunity." Honestly, it was a total bait and switch.
This whole organization isn't set up to actually teach students. It feels like it just exists to make the program look good. You won't get any hands on experience with actual cybersecurity tools. You don't learn anything other than basic IT rules that any kid already knows.
Instead of real concepts, the class is basically just a slideshow making simulator. They will have you up working and rehearsing until 3 AM just to teach older people or small businesses why an antivirus is good for them. You end up wasting 3 or 4 months on nonsense like how an organizational antivirus works, when you could have easily taught yourself all of that in a day or two.
Because of this, any actual cybersecurity concepts you pick up are completely self-learned. Then, right at the end of the semester, they drop a huge bomb on you: you have exactly two weeks to pass the Security+ exam or your grade drops to a C.
I am making this post because students seem to get stuck in it after they sign up since it directly affects your grades. If you want to have an actual cybersecurity experience, please just build a homelab or do something else. You for sure won't get any good and meaningful learning out of OCCIC.
I will say, the one actual benefit to OCCIC is if you want to learn how to speak in public. This is definitely the right course for that because they absolutely force you to get up and present.
But outside of that, don't believe them when they say this program is designed to help you. It is really designed for them. You will put in a ton of hard work, but at the end of the day, all that effort is for their benefit, not yours.