AWS to help Andhra Pradesh govt train students in cloud computing

The Andhra Pradesh government has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Amazon Web Services Inc., the cloud division of the e-commerce behemoth, to build cloud computing and literacy skills in the state under a Cloud for All programme.

According to a statement by AWS reseller Amazon Internet Services Pvt Ltd (AISPL), the MoU, signed by the Andhra Pradesh State Skill Development Corporation (APSSDC), aims to skill more than 30,000 students across 300 engineering and non-engineering colleges in the state.

It further said that it was the APSSDC's mission to upskill 20 million people in the next 15 years.

“It is the aim of the Government of Andhra Pradesh to enhance the employability skills of students and make them industry-ready by the time they come out of the college. The APSSDC has collaborated with the AWS Educate Programme in its mission to provide a skilled workforce across high-priority and emerging sectors," chief minister of Andhra Pradesh N Chandrababu Naidu, said.

As per the MoU, Amazon will provide students and teachers the needed resources to accelerate cloud-skilling.

“The AWS Educate global programme offers the flexibility to meet unique learning needs for students, faculty, and state government skills organisations," Vincent Quah, regional head - Education, Healthcare, Non Profits and Research for Asia-Pacific and Japan, Amazon Web Services, said. 

The Cloud for All programme was started as a pilot in 2017 and the AP government had rolled out the AWS Educate option that saw 10,000 students being enrolled.

In May 2018, more than 200 faculty members from more than 80 engineering colleges were also trained as part of the faculty development initiative. By September 2018, more than 13,000 students were enrolled in the AWS Educate programme from nearly 130 non-engineering colleges.

APSSDC has also hired 100 mentors as trainers to drive the AWS Educate programme and who will work with thousands of students in 13 districts in the state. 

APSSDC said that it will also skill 25,000 students on gaming development technologies with at least 2,000 of them being trained on Amazon Sumerian, which lets developers create and run virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and 3D applications.

APSSDC was formed as a public-private partnership (PPP) corporation to promote skill development and entrepreneurship in the state of Andhra Pradesh. The corporation now serves as the ‘Executive Agency’ for the newly formed Department of Skill Development, Entrepreneurship and Innovation.