Lewis Heuermann
Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi
PhD student, Curriculum & Instruction / Instructional Design and Educational Technology
I work on security problems that don't get clean solutions. Legacy systems, uptime pressure, mixed skill levels, and real operational limits are the default, not the edge case.
My research focus is instructional design for cybersecurity: how hands-on environments build defensive skill that holds up outside the exercise, and how to tell when they do.
[✓] Designing exercises around skill transfer
[~] Turning range designs into reusable patterns
[ ] Publishing formal research outputs
survive contact with reality.
Security ideas are only useful if they survive contact with reality.
I design labs, reference builds, and classroom environments that expose what works, what breaks, and what tradeoffs actually matter. Teaching is where clean frameworks meet messy reality, which is exactly what makes it worth studying.
Instructional Design for Security
Designing hands-on security instruction deliberately: what to scaffold, what to leave hard, and when the environment should do the teaching.
Hands-On Lab Design
Building environments where students investigate, adapt, and develop real instincts. Delivered through Open Cyber Range →
Network Defense & Detection
Segmentation, telemetry, and detection pipelines, built to be broken and rebuilt often enough to teach from.
Environments That Can Prove They Worked
Building the range was the first half. The work in progress is designing what happens inside it on purpose, then gathering enough evidence to say whether the design earned its keep.