Aquia Inc. Adds Cloud Infrastructure Architect Track to Its Aquia Accelerator Apprenticeship Program

Aug 1, 2023

The program prepares apprentices to deploy, manage, and operate workloads on AWS and implement security controls and compliance requirements

MILLSBORO, Del. - Aug. 1, 2023 - PRLog -- Aquia Inc., a Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) specializing in cloud and cybersecurity professional services, today announced the launch of a pilot cloud infrastructure architect (CIA) track of its Aquia Accelerator apprenticeship program. The CIA curriculum is built around a hands-on, fully-immersive data-protection-centric course that lays the foundation for the skills needed to deliver modern, well-architected cloud solutions.

Aquia Accelerator aims to address the cybersecurity talent shortage by providing paid apprenticeships to United States veterans, individuals from underserved communities, and those in the midst of career transitions looking to break into cybersecurity.

Throughout the 8-month-long paid apprenticeship, participants are provided with a dedicated mentor, training materials, real-world delivery examples, and curated courseware. Specifically, the CIA track is designed to prepare individuals with no prior IT or cloud experience to attain the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Certified Solutions Architect - Associate certification with a focus on security.

"The apprentices are being trained not to pass exams, but to be truly knowledgeable, skilled, and competent AWS solutions architects. It's very rewarding to share my knowledge and experience and see that make such a difference in another person's livelihood," said Richard Jones, director of cloud infrastructure architecture at Aquia and former AWS Authorized Instructor (AAI).

The first apprentices in the Aquia Accelerator CIA track are Jake Haas and John Kukuchka.

Jake joined the Marines to support our country and was given an opportunity to transition to cybersecurity after completing his commitments. John has a diverse background in audio engineering and real estate and was prompted to transition careers due to the slowing economy. He sees the Accelerator as a way to pursue his passion in human-technology interactions.

"Cloud has established itself as the de facto way of working and fundamentally changes the landscape of security and operations," said Jonathan (Jono) Sosulska, principal application security architect at Aquia and program lead for Aquia Accelerator. "Soon, cloud will be a requirement for any sort of technical skill and this program aims to modernize how we talk about data and cloud services, and how we work in those spaces effectively."

The company also provides a governance, risk, and compliance track of the Accelerator program, which focuses on enabling individuals to assess systems and organizations, design and implement policies and mitigations, and help drive the public and private sector relationships of our modern stack. The company will welcome its next cohort of Aquia Accelerator GRC apprentices in September 2023 and Accelerator CIA apprentices in Q2 2024.

You can learn more about the Aquia Accelerator program at www.aquia.us/accelerator.

About Aquia Inc.

Securing The Digital Transformation ®

Aquia Inc. is a developer-centric company passionate about the intersection of security and velocity. We maintain a strong bias towards transformational work that disrupts the status quo — delivering elegant, modern solutions to cutting-edge cybersecurity problems.

Founded by military veterans in 2021, we are a Service-Disabled, Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB). Our team has decades of experience driving transformational change across the public sector, enterprise businesses, and top-tier technology companies.

We value trust, accountability, transparency, diversity, and continuous learning; and we've built these tenants into the DNA of our company. For more information, visit www.aquia.us.