FCJ Workforce Program

First Cloud Journey Workforce

First Cloud Journey Workforce (FCJ Workforce) is an AWS training program launched in 2021. Over more than 2 years of operation, the program has brought AWS knowledge to over 2,000 young people and closely mentored more than 150 students.

Graduates from the FCJ Workforce program are now working at various AWS partners and customers. They are also the core force contributing to the building and development of the AWS Study Group community - a learning group with over 41,000 members.

The main goal of FCJ Workforce is to build a high-quality AWS builder team for Vietnam, contributing to the development of the domestic cloud technology industry.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

What are the program start and end dates?

FCJ Workforce typically has two major enrollment periods per year, in January and July. Each course lasts 6 months. However, students can continue learning and networking with the community without time limits after completing the official course.

What are the requirements to join the program?

The program strives to support and mentor as many students as possible. However, due to increasing job requirements, please ensure you meet or understand the following conditions:

  • Basic knowledge of programming and IT (If you’re from a different field, it may take 1 to 1.5 years to learn the foundation)
  • Have a personal computer for practice (minimum 8GB RAM, capable of running Linux)
  • Can create a personal AWS account
  • Can commit to 6 months of study (approximately 10-15 hours/week)
  • Have a self-learning spirit and willingness to share with the community
  • Have basic English reading comprehension skills

Can university students join the program?

Yes, university students can definitely join the program. FCJ Workforce has had many successful student participants from various universities:

  • Hanoi University of Science and Technology
  • University of Engineering and Technology - VNU
  • FPT University
  • University of Science - VNUHCM
  • University of Information Technology - VNUHCM
  • Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education
  • Ton Duc Thang University
  • University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City
  • Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City
  • Van Lang University
  • Hoa Sen University
  • Nguyen Tat Thanh University
  • International University - VNUHCM
  • Saigon University
  • Ho Chi Minh City Open University
  • Posts and Telecommunications Institute of Technology (Southern Branch)
  • Vietnam Aviation Academy
  • Saigon University of Technology
  • Nong Lam University Ho Chi Minh City
  • Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport
  • And many other universities

Important things to ensure:

  • Have basic programming knowledge
  • Can dedicate time to study (about 10-15 hours/week)
  • Have a self-learning spirit and willingness to share
  • Can balance university studies with the program

What support does the program provide for students?

The program offers special support for students:

  • Internship opportunities at AWS partner companies
  • Chance to participate in real projects
  • CV writing and interview preparation support
  • Networking with industry professionals
  • Support for participating in cloud competitions
  • Opportunities to attend AWS events

What if I can’t register for an AWS account?

Common issues when registering for an AWS account and their solutions:

  • Card not supporting international transactions:
    • Use a credit/debit card that supports international payments (Vietcombank, Techcombank, VPBank, etc.)
    • Can use virtual Visa/Master cards from reputable e-wallets (Momo, VNPay, etc.)
  • Invalid address error:
    • Fill in the exact address according to the required format
    • Avoid using special characters and Vietnamese diacritics
    • Use your own phone number
  • Payment verification error:
    • Check available balance in the card (usually needs $1 for verification)
    • Contact your bank to enable international transactions
  • Other cases:
    • Contact mentor or AWS Support for assistance
    • Refer to detailed guides in AWS Study Group

What does the program content include?

The program is divided into specialized tracks, with each student choosing a track that aligns with their career goals:

  1. Basic Track - AWS Foundation (Mandatory):
  • Setting up and managing your first AWS account
  • Cost management with AWS Budgets
  • Basic architecture with VPC, EC2, S3, RDS
  • Identity & Access Management (IAM)
  • Monitoring with CloudWatch
  • AWS CLI and basic Infrastructure as Code
  1. DevOps & Automation Track:
  • CI/CD pipeline with CodePipeline/CodeBuild/CodeDeploy
  • Advanced Infrastructure as Code with CloudFormation/CDK
  • Container orchestration with ECS/EKS
  • Advanced monitoring and observability
  • Blue/Green and Canary deployments
  • DevOps best practices and culture
  1. Security & Compliance Track:
  • Zero Trust Architecture
  • Identity Federation and SSO
  • Encryption and Key Management
  • Security Automation
  • Compliance frameworks
  • Security best practices
  1. Data & Analytics Track:
  • Data Lake architecture
  • ETL pipelines with Glue
  • Real-time analytics
  • Machine Learning operations
  • Business Intelligence
  • Data governance
  1. Serverless & Modern Applications Track:
  • Event-driven architecture
  • Microservices
  • GraphQL APIs with AppSync
  • Serverless patterns
  • Application modernization
  • Performance optimization
  1. AI/ML & Generative AI Track:
  • Foundation Models with Amazon Bedrock
  • RAG pattern implementation
  • Fine-tuning LLMs
  • AI-powered applications
  • Multi-modal AI systems
  • MLOps

Each track requires students to complete:

  • 5 practical projects with increasing difficulty
  • 3 in-depth knowledge sharing sessions
  • Contributions to documentation
  • Mentoring for subsequent cohorts

Practical Projects by Level:

  1. Junior Level Projects:
  • Build complete serverless web application
  • Deploy automated CI/CD pipeline
  • Design monitoring system with custom metrics
  • Implement security following AWS best practices
  • Build simple data pipeline
  1. Middle Level Projects:
  • Microservices architecture with containers
  • Multi-region deployment
  • Advanced security implementation
  • Real-time data processing
  • ML model deployment pipeline
  1. Senior Level Projects:
  • Large-scale distributed systems
  • Multi-tenant architecture
  • Enterprise security framework
  • AI/ML production systems
  • Cross-region disaster recovery
  1. Principal Level Projects:
  • Global-scale applications
  • FinOps optimization framework
  • Zero-trust security platform
  • MLOps platform
  • Enterprise modernization framework

Each project requires:

  • Detailed architecture design
  • Complete implementation
  • Comprehensive documentation
  • Demo video
  • Technical blog post
  • Meetup presentation

Speaker Sharing Program:

  1. AWS Architecture Series:
  • Well-Architected Framework deep dive
  • Microservices best practices
  • Serverless architecture patterns
  • Multi-region strategies
  • Cost optimization techniques
  1. DevOps & Automation Series:
  • GitOps workflows
  • Infrastructure as Code advanced patterns
  • Container orchestration strategies
  • Monitoring & observability
  • Automation best practices
  1. Security & Compliance Series:
  • Zero Trust implementation
  • Security automation
  • Compliance frameworks
  • Incident response
  • Security best practices
  1. Data & Analytics Series:
  • Data Lake architecture
  • Real-time analytics
  • ML operations
  • Data governance
  • Analytics best practices
  1. AI/ML Series:
  • Foundation Models
  • RAG implementations
  • LLM fine-tuning
  • AI applications
  • MLOps practices
  1. Modern Applications Series:
  • Event-driven patterns
  • API design
  • Frontend optimization
  • Mobile backends
  • Performance tuning

Each speaker must:

  • Prepare professional slide deck
  • Live or recorded demo
  • Q&A session
  • Follow-up materials
  • Technical blog post

Are there any program fees or costs?

FCJ Workforce is a non-profit program, so there are no tuition fees. You will need to invest in the following costs:

  • Uniform cost: 250,000 VND (Coolmate) - registration and list will be sent to Coolmate for printing and delivery
  • Practice cost: estimated at 500,000 VND/month (if AWS account is well managed)

How to avoid unexpected costs when using AWS?

Managing personal account costs is the first step we need to understand when making cloud computing our strength. When joining the program, you will receive:

  • Guidance on setting up billing alerts
  • Documentation on cost optimization
  • Mentor review and advice on saving (AWS Well-Architected)
  • Free tier and credits from AWS (through event activities)
  • Guidance on using AWS free services
  • Cost optimization tips for the Vietnamese market

Is the program online or offline?

The program follows a self-paced learning format with a prepared online curriculum. For practice exercises, you will practice on your personal AWS account. Students can learn at their own pace.

Monthly offline meetups are organized at:

  • Hanoi: 25th floor, West Tower, Lotte Center Hanoi, 54 Lieu Giai, Cong Vi Ward, Ba Dinh District
  • Ho Chi Minh City: 36th floor, Bitexco Financial Tower, 2 Hai Trieu, Ben Nghe Ward, District 1

You can be a speaker and share your research or new side projects.

What kind of projects will I work on during the program?

FCJ Workforce focuses on real-world AWS projects, including:

  • Building serverless applications
  • Deploying microservices systems
  • Designing and implementing databases
  • Automating CI/CD pipelines
  • Security and compliance
  • Cost and performance optimization

Projects are designed to help students apply knowledge in practice and build an impressive portfolio.

What are the graduation requirements?

The graduation requirement is to build 5 side projects/workshops that you’re proud to showcase to others. This means the better you are, the harder graduation becomes, as project quality requirements increase based on your capabilities.

Is graduation difficult?

Very difficult, as we don’t evaluate through tests but through your ability to build real-world projects. Requirements increase with your skill level:

  • If you’re junior/middle:

    • Build a complete serverless system on AWS
    • Implement end-to-end CI/CD pipeline with comprehensive testing
    • Build monitoring system with custom metrics and alerts
    • 100% Infrastructure as Code with rollback capability
    • Implement security following CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark
    • Integrate OAuth 2.0 and session management
    • Build API Gateway with rate limiting and caching
    • Design cloud-optimized database schema
    • Implement backup and restore strategy

  • If you’re senior/principle:

    • Build distributed system capable of:
      • DDoS protection at Network and Application layers
      • Multi-dimensional auto-scaling with 1M CCU
      • Latency < 100ms at 99th percentile
      • 99.99% availability
    • Fully implement:
      • OWASP Top 10 and SANS Top 25
      • Cloud Design Patterns
      • AWS Well-Architected Framework
      • Twelve-Factor App methodology
    • Deploy:
      • Multi-Region Active-Active Architecture
      • Zero Trust Security with IAM Roles
      • Event-Driven Architecture with Kinesis/Kafka
      • Service Mesh with Istio/App Mesh
      • Blue-Green and Canary Deployments
    • Optimize:
      • Operating costs < $1000/month for 1M users
      • Recovery Time Objective (RTO < 15 minutes)
      • Recovery Point Objective (RPO < 1 minute)
    • Build:
      • Chaos Engineering Framework
      • Security Automation and Compliance Checks
      • Cost Optimization Pipeline
      • Performance Testing Framework

The key is the word “proud” - each project must be a complete case study where you can:

  • Present detailed architecture
  • Demo all features
  • Explain every design decision
  • Prove achieved metrics
  • Share lessons learned
  • Write in-depth blog posts

With project quality meeting requirements, you will:

  • Qualify to apply for AWS Community Builder
  • Be invited as a speaker at AWS events
  • Have opportunities to contribute to AWS blogs
  • Get priority access to AWS beta programs
  • Receive AWS credits for further development
  • Connect with AWS Heroes and experts
  • Have opportunities to contribute to AWS open source

Learn more about AWS Community Builder: https://aws.amazon.com/developer/community/community-builders/

What job opportunities are available after graduation?

After graduation, you can pursue positions at leading companies in Vietnam:

  • AWS Partner Companies:
    • FPT Software
    • VNG
    • Tiki
    • Shopee
    • Techcombank
    • Vietcombank
    • VPBank
    • HDBank
    • MSB
    • PhuLong
    • PVcom
    • ACBS
    • Bamboo Airways
    • VTV
    • VietjetAir
    • Jio Health
    • Tinhvan Consulting
    • Ahamove
    • Vingroup
    • Masan Group
    • Circle K
    • FE Credit
    • VIB
    • Vietnam Airlines
    • Grove
    • And many others
  • Multinational Companies:
    • Amazon
    • Gameloft
    • Lazada
    • Yandex
    • FPT
    • Home Credit
    • CitiGroup
    • Codeforce
    • Grab
    • And others

What job search support does the program provide?

The volunteer team can support you with the following to increase job search and competitiveness:

  • Internship placement at AWS partner companies
  • Priority job referrals at AWS partners and customers
  • Provide reference letters
  • CV writing and interview preparation support
  • Organize networking events with companies
  • Support in applying to become AWS Community Builder

What networking opportunities will you have?

By joining the program, you’ll have many networking opportunities through:

  • Joining the AWS Study Group community with over 41,000 members
  • Connecting with AWS expert mentors and volunteer team
  • Participating in monthly offline and online community events:
    • AWS User Group Vietnam
    • AWS Community Day Vietnam
    • AWS Summit Vietnam
    • Monthly meetups at:
      • Hanoi: 25th floor, West Tower, Lotte Center Hanoi, 54 Lieu Giai, Cong Vi Ward, Ba Dinh District
      • Ho Chi Minh City: 36th floor, Bitexco Financial Tower, 2 Hai Trieu, Ben Nghe Ward, District 1
  • Opportunity to meet and learn from previous cohorts (Champions from previous seasons)
  • Support in applying to become AWS Community Builder with opportunity to connect with global AWS experts

What if I get stuck during practice? What if I don’t understand the practice steps?

As AWS interface and features are frequently updated, documentation updates by the volunteer team typically occur twice a year, so there will always be unexpected errors during practice. During practice, students can receive support from:

  • Volunteer team via WhatsApp
  • AWS Study Group community on Facebook
  • Weekly office hours
  • Regular code review sessions
  • Updated documentation and FAQ

Registration Link:

If you’re interested and want to become a member of the FCJ team, please register here:

https://pulse.aws/application/NJ8X4DBX

Registration for FCJ Workforce 2025 - Season 1 will close on February 15, 2025. Participation guidance emails will be sent after the registration deadline.