Robert Morris University became the first member of the Amazon Web Services program over the summer, and Jameela Al Jaroodi, associate professor of software engineering, and Natalya Goreva, assistant professor of computer and information systems, are both undergoing training courses that will certify them to teach courses using AWS at RMU.
The training courses are online courses that last four hours long for five days a week for two weeks, and then the professors will prepare for a certification exam. The two-week courses will cover basic concepts of cloud computing, the technologies being used and how to set up and how to operate AWS based technologies and software programs.
“We log onto Amazon Console, it’s called. It’s a virtual account. It is just for training services,” said Goreva. “We can see an account and we can add and modify and play with different Amazon cloud services, such as data storage and programming servers.”
Robert Morris University will need to offer at least one course every year, taught by a professor who is certified. The courses will use the same models Jaroodi and Goreva are participating in during their training. Jaroodi currently thinks the course would do well as an elective course here at RMU.
“As a computer science software engineer, I see this as a specialized course. When we offer this for other students, it is going to be something that I would prefer for this to be optional. It opens up a certain market,” said Jaroodi. “It is going to be attractive for quite a few employers, but still, being well-trained in the overall field is important, so what we are trying to do now is look into the best ways to incorporate this into the program without compromising the program.”
Goreva has already used AWS products before in her classrooms to teach students a real-life program and offer a way to give the students the ability to work remotely. Joining the program allows her to offer her students more hands-on experiences through models and experiments directly from AWS.
“I already was using their services. When I started, I got an advanced programming course and I really wanted to show students the real client-server programming architecture. So I wanted a server and I wanted for them to be able to connect to it,” said Goreva. “After I got my account and was able to access my server, and it turned out really great because my students can log into the server from any location through the university VPN.”
For more information on Robert Morris University’s computer information science programs click here. For more information on Robert Morris University’s engineering programs click here.
