Amazon's AFE Bridging Gap Between Talent And Opportunity: Akshay Kashyap

Amazon’s Future Engineer (AFE) program initiated by Amazon.in on Monday announced the expansion of its partnership with the National Education Society for Tribal Students (NESTS) under the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Government of India Amazon Future Engineer program in 54 Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRS) across the states of Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan and Telangana. 

Talking about the program, Akshay Kashyap, India Lead, Amazon Future Engineer, said, “We started this program called Amazon Future Engineer (AFE). Our idea was to try to bridge the gap that exists currently between talent and opportunity. So AFE is a childhood to career programme, where we support kids who are farther from opportunity, underrepresented, and under-served to get access to quality computer science education.”

He also mentioned that this program is being carried forward by partnering with the government ecosystem, non-profit organisations and educational institutions. 

About the program, Kashyap added that they are working with the schools to assemble a curriculum so that computer science can be introduced and also building learning journeys for students so that they can understand how is computer science applied in the real world. 

Along with AFE, Kashyap also mentioned that Amazon is running run something called the Amazon Future Engineer Scholarship Intern Programme, where they have given scholarships to 500 girls this year and 200 girls last year, and as a part of that scholarship, they also give girls a chance to come and become an intern at Amazon.

AFE has given encouraging outcomes in its pilot phase, underlining the same, Kashyap added, “In the country, we've reached 1.4 million kids around 8000 schools. One of the partnerships that we do with 54 schools of EMRs. We started that with a three-day training programme here for 54 school teachers who actually went back and also taught more teachers. And the idea was once that three-day training happened that, we would keep supporting teachers through virtual interactions.”

The best feature of the program is that it facilitates technology education in a more simplified way and in regional languages that is helping the students to understand the technology in a better manner.

Based on the encouraging results of last year’s implementation, the revised module will introduce a customized coding and artificial intelligence (AI) curriculum that is aligned with CBSE skill education. This will be in addition to the current courses in coding, logical sequencing, learning loops, and block programming. 

Arjun Munda, Minister of Tribal Affairs, Government of India who launched the program’s pilot phase, said, “Amazon Future Engineer Program initiative is a huge step towards ensuring that the succeeding tribal generations become well-equipped to leverage digital opportunities. Collaboration between Amazon Future Engineer program and NESTS, has the potential to bridge the academic gap existent among tribal communities, ensuring their successful careers in emerging technologies.” 

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs has set up Eklavya Model Residential Schools in order to provide quality education to tribal students in various states. The National Education Society for Tribal Students plays an important role in the establishment, management, operations and maintenance of the EMRSs.