AWS Public Sector Blog

Category: Public Sector

Boolean Girl

Empowering girls with STEM education, safely and at scale

Boolean Girl is educating girls to code, build, invent, and animate. It provides enrichment classes, all-girl camps, special events, and partnerships, preparing girls everywhere to explore computer programming and engineering. Boolean Girl hosts its website on the cloud and is core to everything it does: telling its story, registering students and taking payment for camps and after-school clubs, processing donations, organizing events, building our email lists, and running its online university. Boolean Girl uses the AWS Nonprofit Credit Program to cover vital IT expenses while achieving its mission.

Alexa EdTech Challenge India

Announcing Amazon Alexa India EdTech Skills Challenge 2020 finalists and competition date

AWS, together with EdTechReview, announced a voice technology in education contest at the EdTechReview 2020 conference. The competition, open to EdTechs in India, aims to build skills that address education challenges and positively impact students, faculty, administrators, and other educational stakeholders using Amazon Alexa in education. We received over 100 applications and selected five as finalists to compete for the title of “Best Amazon Alexa EdTech Skill 2020, India.”

woman about to get her blood drawn

European Convalescent Plasma Collection Platform: Data-driven initiative to fight COVID-19

The European Commission, with three of its Directorates-General (DG) (DG SANTE, DG DIGIT, and DG CONNECT) in collaboration with the European Blood Alliance (EBA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), created the European Union (EU) COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma (CCP) Platform. This database is based on the concept of passive immunization (an approach promoted by the World Health Organization (WHO) Blood Regulators Network), which tests the potential of plasma collected from convalescent persons to treat or prevent viruses and diseases such as COVID-19.

Amazon Alexa EMEA EdTech Skills Challenge

“Alexa, how will these skills impact education?” Vote for your favourite skill in the EMEA Alexa EdTech Skills Challenge

Voting is now open for the 2020 Amazon Alexa Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) EdTech Skills Challenge. The competition challenged EMEA-based EdTechs to use voice technology to transform education. The six finalists designed Alexa skills to positively impact challenges in education such as improving teaching practices, learning throughout life, continuing professional development, and simplifying administration and assessment processes. Public voting is open until July 25, 2020.

external shot of high school building with columns and stairs

Chesterfield County Public Schools uses machine learning to predict county’s chronic absenteeism

Chesterfield County Public Schools (CCPS) in Virginia uses machine learning on Amazon Web Services (AWS) to predict the county’s rate of chronic absenteeism in high schools. CCPS includes 64 schools and over 63,000 students. They started with a high-impact project that would use data the school system was already capturing about its students. to tackle predicting chronic absenteeism.

hands outstretched holding euros

Five ways nonprofits can reduce the burden associated with fundraising activities

Nonprofits around the world should be able to concentrate on mission-critical activities such as fundraising, instead of focusing on managing their technology infrastructure. Without the burden of worrying about IT, nonprofits can focus on telling their unique stories to drive donations and engagement. Here are five ways that nonprofits can use AWS to accelerate their fundraising.

AWS Educate

AWS announces the expansion of cloud computing curricula to seven institutions in India

Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced that seven higher education institutions in India will adopt cloud computing curricula from its AWS Educate initiative to help develop the next generation of cloud professionals. The cloud computing content will be offered as part of undergraduate degree and postgraduate diploma programs starting in September 2020.

Data center with employee monitoring at end of hallway

Is your on-premises data center weighing you down? Accelerate your cloud journey with these cost-savings strategies

When considering a move to the cloud, many organizations struggle with a common problem: the migration bubble. This bubble is formed when organizations are covering expenses for their current on-premises infrastructure while incurring new costs for a cloud migration. But what if you could use that legacy hardware to your advantage? These cost-savings strategies can help free up budget resources and accelerate your journey to the cloud.

laptop next to a pile of paperwork and a pen

Improving customer experience for benefits eligibility and enrollment

State governments are currently experiencing a spike in the number of applications for social benefit programs. These programs serve millions of people every year to support healthcare and to help keep them out of poverty. To address the surge, agencies are looking at cloud-based services including artificial intelligence (AI), conversational bots, and call centers to improve the customer experience as well as workforce productivity, provide more visibility for agency leadership into program performance, and help reduce fraud, waste, and abuse.