Main image of article Amazon Launches New Courses to Teach You A.I.

For tech professionals everywhere, learning the tools and techniques associated with artificial intelligence (A.I.) and machine learning could have a sizable impact on their careers for years to come. Many organizations have already spun up programs designed to teach the practical uses of A.I. Now Amazon is joining that collective effort with a new initiative, “AI Ready,” which will offer A.I. skills and training education.

The initiative includes eight new courses via Amazon Web Services (AWS). For non-technical audiences, those courses include:

  • Introduction to Generative Artificial Intelligence: This course is a top-level introduction to the concepts and applications of generative A.I. (available via AWS Educate).
     
  • Generative AI Learning Plan for Decision Makers: This coursework includes planning a generative A.I. project, as well as effectively building out an organization devoted to generative A.I. (available via AWS Skill Builder).
     
  • Introduction to Amazon CodeWhisperer: This course is designed to show participants how to use CodeWhisperer, Amazon’s A.I.-powered coding tool (available via AWS Educate).

For tech pros, Amazon’s other courses offer a more intensive deep dive into A.I.:

  • Foundations of Prompt Engineering: This course covers prompt engineering, a rapidly growing skill-set within the broader A.I. ecosystem (available via AWS Skill Builder).
     
  • Low-Code Machine Learning on AWS: No- and low-code tools could dictate how software engineers and other tech professionals build software for years to come. This coursework covers how these workers can prepare and deploy machine learning models with a minimum of coding (available via AWS Skill Builder).
     
  • Building Language Models on AWS: This course focuses on utilizing Amazon SageMaker to construct and refine language models (available via AWS Skill Builder).
     
  • Amazon Transcribe—Getting Started: This tool converts speech to text; the course shows how to use it effectively (available via AWS Skill Builder).
     
  • Building Generative AI Applications Using Amazon Bedrock: This course delves into how to use Amazon Bedrock to build generative A.I. applications (available via AWS Skill Builder).

Amazon will also spend $12 million on a “AWS Generative A.I. Scholarship,” which could provide as many as 50,000 high school and university students with A.I.-related education; this effort includes access to a generative A.I. course on Udacity. 

As more businesses rely on generative A.I. for everything from writing code and researching business strategies to crafting the first drafts of important text, tech professionals will need to understand how these technologies work, and how to effectively integrate them into a modern tech stack.

On a day-to-day basis, A.I. could have a seismic impact on the average tech professional’s workflow. According to consulting firm McKinsey’s Technology Trends Outlook 2023 report, generative A.I. will doubtlessly result in a new generation of no- and low-code tools, along with automated QA and code review. “A.I.-enabled tools can also enhance the productivity of traditional developers by automating routine tasks and suggesting solutions to problems. Our research shows that developers report time savings of 35 to 45 percent in code generation and 20 to 30 percent in code refactoring,” that report mentioned.

In other words, A.I. could radically change how you do your job. By learning as much as possible right now, you can “future proof” your career as A.I. becomes more sophisticated.