It’s a modern spin on “take your child to work day.”
For Sherrie Hill and her son Kavary of Woodbridge, it was mother and son taking each other to a pre-apprenticeship program at Germanna Community College.
The pair spent the past four weeks in an intensive training program with Amazon Web Services designed to prepare them for the careers that build, connect, power, and operate the information infrastructure, such as data centers, proliferating across the Fredericksburg area.
The Hills were part of the first cohort of 20 students at GCC to complete the AWS Information Infrastructure Pre-Apprenticeship program (I2PA), a four-week program that Amazon recently launched in Virginia, Mississippi and Ohio.
Sayed Mujtaba Sadaat (left) and Mohammad Naim (right) look over their certificates after graduating from the AWS class at Germanna. (Photos by Suzanne Carr-Rossi for Germanna)
Amazon has invested $35 billion in the region to create data centers in Spotsylvania, Caroline, Stafford and Louisa counties. That investment includes preparing a workforce to build, operate and maintain the infrastructure surrounding those facilities. The students trained in the Germanna program were chosen and paid by Amazon Web Services.
“We started here because this is where we’re going to build infrastructure,” said Nick Lee-Romagnolo, AWS principal workforce development director. “There is a challenge with having people who can run a data center where there is no data center yet. You don’t have the skills … So the idea is to give people exposure to the entire information infrastructure that’s going in across the country, but especially is going into the Fredericksburg region.”
While the program doesn’t specifically train the students to work in data centers, it offers them a look at all the elements required to build and run one.
“So all the skilled trades, the entire construction industry, anything you would think about for any large critical facility to be built,” Lee-Romagnolo said. “Those are the skills we need — not for AWS necessarily — but for our contractors and sub-contractors who are local businesses.”
The I2PA grads listen to speakers before getting their certificates Friday.
Tina Lance, GCC’s dean of professional and technical studies and workforce development, led the ceremony Friday at GCC’s Workforce and Technology Center. The students were presented with certifications from AWS, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and fiber optic fusion splicing.
The students spent 120 hours learning about electrical systems, HVAC, fiber optics, mechanical systems, computer servers, software and “durable” skills like interviewing, resume writing and leadership principles.
“With data centers coming into our service region,” said Lance, “it’s really important that we provide training to support the labor that not only builds them, but also maintains them. In order to increase awareness of data center-labor needs Amazon Web Services partnered with Germanna to create a pre-apprenticeship course that provides an overview of each of these disciplines.”
The classes were taught by vendors and contractors who work with AWS, and the entire program was administered by GCC. More apprenticeships will be up for grabs during the National Apprenticeship Week Hiring Fair, Nov. 18-19 at the Fredericksburg campus and Nov. 20-21 at the Culpeper campus. Job seekers and businesses are asked to register ahead of time.
Sherrie Hill was already a Germanna student with an AWS cloud certification and some experience in JavaScript when she learned about the new I2PA program. “We kind of lucked out on both getting into the program…I find this infrastructure concept important and in-demand… tech is the way to go and as things are growing, I want to use any opportunity to further my skills,” she said.
She admits being excited and a little intimidated at first because of her age and being a woman, “but everyone was so nice and the instructors were amazing. We built a team atmosphere and it was wonderful.”
Her 25-year-old son Kavary was already working in the HVAC industry when his mom encouraged him to join the program with her.
“It just caught my interest and my mom knows what I want to do and she knows what to look for,” he said. “Once I saw the other programs, I fell in love with, honestly, all of it. The fiber splicing was really appealing to me.”
(Photo by Suzanne Carr-Rossi for Germanna)
Graduates of the program are encouraged to find a specific pathway to pursue after the class ends. After a lunch break Friday, students could speak to potential employers at an informal networking job fair.
Both of the Hills felt confident they would soon be able to put their new skills to work.
“I believe that we can get hired on very fast — whether it be my mom or me first, whomever gets a job first,” said Kavary Hill. “That’s the dream, that’s the goal, right?”
