Virginia Tech's CIA Officer-in-Residence arrives on campus
Kenneth Stiles, an officer with the CIA with over 25 years experience, is joining Virginia Tech as a visiting faculty member through 2012.
Stiles will teach courses and work with the Ted and Karyn Hume Center for National Security and Technology, as well as the Intelligence Community Center of Excellence, both affiliated with Virginia Tech. The Intelligence Community Center is in partnership with Howard University and focuses on national security issues. The Virginia Tech Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science helped establish the Ted and Karyn Hume Center for National Security and Technology in 2010 to engage students and faculty who are interested in working with intelligence community agencies.
Stiles' appointment is in the geography department due to his professional expertise in Geographic Information Systems (GIS) analysis and remote sensing, yet his courses will include intelligence and national security topics as well as GIS.
During the spring 2011 semester, Stiles will teach a course on the history, organization, and function of the CIA within the intelligence community. He will be offering a GIS course in fall 2011 that will show students how the intelligence community uses such GIS applications in its analytic support to both policy makers and U.S. military forces in the field.
Stiles was hired by the CIA in 1984 as an imagery analyst. Additionally, he has worked with accounts covering societal issues, the Middle East, information operations, and most recently counterterrorism. He has worked in three of the four main directorates of the CIA. He has also completed tours in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Europe, and he recently returned from a tour in Iraq.
Throughout his career with the CIA, Stiles has taught individuals from U.S. military personnel to fellow agency officers to foreign liaison analysts. His vast array of experiences and expertise "will provide Virginia Tech's students and faculty with a tremendous asset over the next two years," said Jeff Reed, interim director of the Hume Center and Virginia Tech's Willis G. Worcester Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Stiles has a bachelor's degree in history from Randolph-Macon College and a master's in history/military studies from Old Dominion University.
The CIA's Officer-in-Residence program sends employees for two-year tours on the faculties of participating colleges and universities. The objective is to promote broader understanding of intelligence roles and missions, closer collaboration with the academic community, and contributions to the scholarly literature on intelligence. Stiles will also be providing guest lectures to other courses taught by Virginia Tech faculty.
