2025 Community Leadership Award Recipient

David Sherry

Former Chief Information Security Officer, Princeton University

The 2025 EDUCAUSE Community Leadership Award recognizes David Sherry for developing collective awareness and skills surrounding cybersecurity, focusing on the human dimensions of cooperative action to sustain a culture of shared success in higher education.

David J. Sherry is an information security leader with a distinguished career in higher education and the financial sector. As Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Princeton University, he designed, staffed, and led the inaugural Information Security Office, overseeing security architecture, operations, risk assessment, and policy, governance, and compliance. David's career is marked by success in personnel management, enterprise security strategy, and his instrumental role in fostering a culture of security. He is skilled in project management and strategic planning and builds high-performing teams in dynamic environments by focusing on compliance and governance and using education, awareness, and reporting.

David's commitment to the higher education community is a central theme of his career. He began participating in EDUCAUSE shortly after being hired at Brown University in 2008, a journey he credits to the encouragement of Rodney Peterson. David believes his community leadership is built on the foundation laid by others who came before him. Since 2011, he has served as an official conference coach and mentor, and he maintains contact with almost everyone he has been matched with. David has also assisted security missions at institutions of all sizes across the nation, and he works hard to never refuse a request for assistance.

David’s involvement with EDUCAUSE extends to various leadership roles. He chaired the EDUCAUSE Security and Privacy Professionals conference in 2016 and is a faculty member for the Management Institute, where he helps shape and teaches in the Cybersecurity Management Institute. David's insights on emerging security topics have established him as a highly regarded conference speaker and a nationally recognized thought leader in security culture. His work has been featured in publications from Medium.com to Security Current.

Prior to his role at Princeton, David served as CISO at Brown University for eight years. He also brings extensive experience from the financial sector, where he held leadership positions at Citizens Bank and DefendNet Solutions. He began his professional life at the United States Postal Service, where he was honored for his work on an e-commerce project named the Federal Project of the Year. David holds an MBA in Management Science from Northeastern University and a BS in Business Management from Providence College. He is also a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and a Certified Information Security Manager (CISM).

This EDUCAUSE Award is sponsored by Moran Technology Consulting, Mission Partner.