An Amazon Web Services (AWS) outage that affected websites and apps around the world has prompted reflection on the ways schools rely on technology.
According to NBC, AWS, Amazon’s cloud-computing platform built for software developers, recently faced an outage that impacted an estimated 1,000 websites and services that utilize AWS to run. Among these websites was Canvas, the learning management system used by many schools to manage course materials and grades.
“Some students weren’t able to do the assignments that were due the day of the outage,” said Andrew Ramroth, a math and Advancement Via Individual Development (AVID) teacher at Carlmont High School. “I couldn’t access student grades, and neither could the students.”
Students shared a similar perspective about how they were affected by the AWS outage.
“AP Classroom and Canvas were down, so I wasn’t able to check my grades or see assignments. It was also harder for me to study for tests,” said Diana Velisar, a sophomore at Carlmont.
Others believed, however, that the outage did not have a particularly profound effect.
“I think there was a lot of variation on how impactful the outage was,” said Atul Jain, a software engineer at Adobe. “If we look worldwide and across all age groups, it was probably not significantly impactful.” According to Amazon, Adobe collaborates with AWS on a variety of office and creativity apps.
Other platforms affected by the AWS outage included The New York Times, Microsoft Teams, and Zoom, according to Yahoo News. The company later made a public announcement about the outage.
In a status update from AWS, the company stated that staff worked to resolve network connectivity issues until all services running on AWS returned to normal conditions.
Following the effects of this outage, thoughts have arisen about reliance on technology in academic settings.
“I firmly believe that there is going to be substantial technological evolution in almost all fields, including education. And the majority of that evolution should improve the lives of the general population,” Jain said.
While some feel that the implementation of technology will improve education in schools, others believe that there could be downsides to it.
“Using technology in schools comes with a lot of benefits, but it also comes with costs,” Ramroth said. “If I didn’t have access to the software where I save my lessons, I’d lose a lot of my class material.”
Looking ahead, technology will likely continue to evolve at a rapid pace, increasing its incorporation into various aspects of daily life.
“The pace of technological evolution has been going up, and it will not slow down. The last few years of artificial intelligence technology evolution are a testimony to that,” Jain said.
