Teaching in fast-moving fields with real cases presents three persistent problems. First, the news cycle moves more rapidly than any course can adapt. Second, such as in cybersecurity, real incidents involve confidential details, ongoing litigation, or charged political contexts that derail objective analysis. When you assign the Snowden case, students arrive with preformed opinions. Third, creating realistic technical, personal, and organizational documentation—network logs, incident reports, executive briefings, police reports, interview transcripts, and so on—requires extensive research time that most faculty don’t have.
