CIST 2484 - AWS Cloud Operations

Prerequisite: CIST 2480
This course prepares students to deploy, manage, secure, and operate scalable systems on Amazon Web Services (AWS). Based on the AWS Academy Cloud Operations curriculum, the course focuses on operational excellence in cloud environments, covering monitoring, automation, governance, networking, security, and lifecycle management for AWS workloads. Students will gain hands‑on experience provisioning and configuring AWS compute, storage, database, and networking services, as well as implementing best practices for system reliability, availability, and cost efficiency. Core topics include identity and access management (IAM), load balancing and auto scaling, virtual private cloud (VPC) configuration, patch management, infrastructure as code (IaC) using AWS CloudFormation, and designing operational playbooks. Emphasis is placed on monitoring and incident response using Amazon CloudWatch, CloudTrail, AWS Config, and AWS Systems Manager. Students learn to troubleshoot common operational issues, analyze log and metric data, and implement automated remediation workflows. Practical labs include deploying managed services, optimizing resources, securing environments, enforcing compliance, and managing multi‑tier architectures in production‑like scenarios. By the end of the course, students will be able to perform cloud operations tasks, automate administrative functions, and support live AWS workloads. The course prepares students for cloud operations roles and for the AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate exam. Note: Students enrolled in this course will be assessed a $43.75 cost recovery fee in addition to tuition and fees. Fees can change at the end of the semester. Contact hours: 2 2 Credit hours: 4