KASTEL certificate for students
The requirements of the free economy on computer scientists are highly diverse. KIT offers students the opportunity to specialize in various fields. Therefore, it is necessary to issue a certificate that is meaningful to employers and reflects special qualifications that go beyond the choice of “Vertiefungsfächer” (specialization areas).
The KASTEL certificate was introduced in 2013 to provide students with proof of specialization in the field of IT security. It was then partially replaced in 2018 by the introduction of specialization profiles in the Master’s degree course in Computer Science, but continues to provide a qualified certificate for graduates of related courses, such as the Master’s in Business Informatics. The KASTEL certificate thus makes it possible to complete a general, broad, general course of study and at the same time obtain proof of specialization in the field of IT security. The certificate therefore documents a qualification comparable to a specialized Master’s degree and enhances the students’ competitiveness in the job market.
Complete description text.
A complete overview of the conditions for the certificate can be found in this document.
A list of current events can be found on the subpage “Events”. This includes lectures, seminar and internships that can be credited.
Requirements
The students should be able to fulfil the requirements necessary for the certificate during their studies by completing regular academic achievements. The activities are divided into three categories.
Required basic knowledge is taught in the mandatory part (I). Events from the second category (II) deal in detail with individual aspects of security and provide a sound knowledge of the respective topic. In the third category (III) students can broaden their knowledge in areas that are closely related to information security, but do not deal directly with security at heart – be it because their focus is not on security-related topics or because the level at which the topics are dealt with is too much abstracted from the way in which they can be realized.
The scope of the necessary achievements for the certificate amounts to 30 ECTS points plus the final thesis from the field of information security. Of these, 6 points and the final thesis come from the mandatory part. At least 14 points come from the second category. The remaining 10 points can be collected with events from the second and third categories. However, one of the events must be a practical course.