Amazon supports computer science education across the U.S.

The Amazon Future Engineer program is taking a variety of steps to help elementary schoolers and high school graduates pursue their computer science dreams.

Amazon Future Engineer is funding computer science education and teacher professional development for every elementary school in the Dallas Independent School District in Texas and Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland. In total, 286 elementary schools and roughly 130,000 students will be impacted.

Amazon is working with BootUp, a nonprofit professional development provider specializing in elementary school education. Due to the uncertainty surrounding the upcoming school year, BootUp has modified its professional development to work in a virtual setting. In addition to these two programs, Amazon Future Engineer is funding computer science education for nearly 200,000 elementary school students at more than 400 schools across the country.

Furthermore, 100 high school students across the country have been awarded $40,000 Amazon Future Engineer college scholarships to study computer science. Each student also received an offer of a paid internship at Amazon after their first year in college. And this year, they will also receive a selection of college essentials, including a Prime Student membership, Fire HD 8 tablet, and $100 credit to use for college textbook needs. 

This is the second class of students to receive this award from Amazon Future Engineer. The 2020 class of scholarship recipients come from 30 states, and more than 50% of them identify as female. All of the students qualify for financial assistance for college. For the first time, one of the scholarship recipients is from a U.S. territory—Puerto Rico. 

Amazon Future Engineer funds introductory and Advanced Placement computer science courses in more than 2,000 high schools serving more than 100,000 students in underserved and underrepresented communities. Amazon’s funding also provides preparatory lessons, tutorials, professional development for teachers, digital curriculum for students, and live online support for both teachers and students. 

All educators and students participating in this program have access to a no-cost membership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) Educate, Amazon’s global initiative to provide students resources for building skills in cloud technology.