Amazon Introduces Free AI Courses To Train Millions

In a bid to make artificial intelligence (AI) education more accessible, Amazon has launched “AI Ready,” a new commitment to provide free AI skills training to 2 million people globally by 2025. The announcement arrives when the demand for AI talent is on the rise. Research conducted by Amazon Web Services (AWS) has found that workers with AI skills could earn up to 47% more in salaries.

The demand for AI-skilled talent is a high priority for 73% of employers, but three out of four who consider it significant are struggling to find the needed AI talent. Amazon’s “AI Ready” commitment aims to address this gap. The project launches new initiatives for adults and young learners and expands Amazon’s existing free AI training programs, aiming to eliminate cost as a barrier to obtaining these crucial skills.

Supporting professionals in the workplace, Amazon is introducing these new courses open to anyone and aligned with in-demand jobs. The courses cater to different proficiency levels and are designed for both business leaders and technologists. “There is something for everyone with courses ranging from foundational to advanced and for business leaders as well as technologists,” Amazon stated in its announcement. “These courses augment the 80+ free and low-cost AI and generative AI courses and resources provided through AWS.”

Amazon’s AI Ready initiative includes eight new, free AI and generative AI courses, an AWS Generative AI Scholarship for more than 50,000 high school and university students worldwide, and a new collaboration with Code.org to assist students in learning about generative AI. The AWS Generative AI Scholarship will offer Udacity scholarships, valued at over $12 million, to more than 50,000 students from underserved and underrepresented communities globally.

To make AI learning more appealing to younger students, Amazon is also introducing the Hour of Code Dance Party: AI Edition, in collaboration with Amazon Future Engineer and Code.org. In this hour-long introduction to coding and AI, students will create a virtual music video set to hit songs from popular artists.

Amazon’s AI Ready initiative is a further commitment to AWS’s ongoing investment of hundreds of millions of dollars to provide free cloud computing skills training to 29 million people by 2025. This initiative has already trained more than 21 million people, underscoring Amazon’s larger aim of equipping more people with valuable technical skills.