June 17, 2026 – September 30, 2026
Throughout this time, we will host study sessions, lab days, game days, and other opportunities to connect with fellow challenge participants.

1) Get Certified: Equip yourself with recognized certifications from AWS that will advance your career within your teams and domains.

2) Grow with SWA: As SWA grows, you grow as well! This competition helps to build a group of highly skilled professionals, strengthening our company’s core.

3) Win Prizes: Winners of the competition will earn amazing prizes, including Southwest SWAG and recognition from senior leaders!

Participate in our Pluralsight Cloud Certification Competition and unlock the opportunity to grow your cloud skills with the industry’s top certification courses. Employees from our College Hire Program will compete to earn certifications in two key focus areas: AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner or AWS Solutions Architect (Associate). Do this by completing courses, hands-on labs, and exams, you’ll unlock skills to enhance your career—and earn points to win prizes!

Please choose one of the following focus areas for this competition:

• AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner (Beginner)

    • If you are new to AWS, a Product Owner, Scrum Master, Analyst, etc you may want to start here.

• AWS Solutions Architect – Associate (Intermediate)

    •If you already have your Cloud Practitioner Cert and are an engineer, you may want to focus on this certification.

Kickoff Session:
Join us for an inspiring kickoff event where we’ll explain how this competition will benefit both SWA and you as an individual. We’ll set the stage for your certification journey and show you how this initiative can fast-track your professional growth. Let’s launch this journey together!

Labs:
Need some hands-on experience? We will lead one-hour sessions focused on labs, sandboxes, and practical learning. Get in there and start playing around with AWS tools and services and learn in real time!

Study Halls:
Periodically, we'll host study hall hours where we pick a section of the certification material for in-depth group study or just have a designated time to work through the course. This is a great opportunity to have allocated time on your calendar, clarify concepts, ask questions, and stay on track with your learning goals and objectives.

Game Days:
During the last month of the competition, we'll host study hall hours where we pick a section of the certification material to review in a fun and engaging way. This is a great opportunity to test your knowledge, compete for more points and prepare for the certification exams.

June 17 - Kickoff

July 1 - Lab Session
Static Site Hosting with S3

July 15 - One Month Update & Short Lab Session
AWS IAM

July 29 - Game Day
Compute and Networking

August 05 - Intern Conclusion & Game Day
Storage and Databases

August 12 - Lab Session
Serverless

August 26 - Game Day
Monitoring, Security, and Cost Management

September 02 - Lab Session
Infrastructure as Code (IaC)

September 16 - Game Day
Review

September 30 - Conclusion & Awards

To get started, you’ll need to access Pluralsight. Follow the instructions on SWALife for logging into your Pluralsight account provided by Southwest:

https://wnco.sharepoint.com/sites/SWALife-Technology-Secure/SitePages/Pluralsight.aspx

Email us at CHIP-training-DG@wnco.com with any questions you have! Let’s build cloud confidence, together.