Could a 26-Year-Old With a CS Degree Break Into Cloud Engineering?
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MellowPine47
I'm 26 and recently completed a second bachelor's degree, this time in Computer Science. My first degree was in History and Political Science, and I also have a couple of years of experience in cloud account-executive sales. I'm considering pursuing a part-time master's degree in Finance, but my main goal is to move into a technical cloud career. Would employers consider me for an entry-level Cloud Engineer position, or should I target a different role first?
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It is possible to land a cloud engineering job straight out of college, especially through an internship or a company with a junior-level infrastructure role. I started that way with a CS degree, basic networking and security certifications, and an internship. Learning Terraform and applying for junior Infrastructure Engineer positions may give you a more realistic entry point than applying only to jobs titled Cloud Engineer.
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Cloud Engineer usually isn’t considered a true entry-level role. Employers generally want some hands-on experience supporting applications, infrastructure, or cloud environments. Your CS degree is useful, but you’ll probably have better results starting with cloud support, application support, or a junior cloud administrator position and then moving up.
BrightCedar19: Exactly. Any role that gives you practical exposure to deployments, troubleshooting, networking, identity, and cloud operations can help you build toward engineering.
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The number of degrees won’t matter as much as what you can actually demonstrate. Build projects involving networking, Linux, scripting, Terraform or another infrastructure-as-code tool, CI/CD, monitoring, and a major cloud platform. A portfolio showing that you can deploy and maintain something is likely more convincing than another academic credential.
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A practical certification path could be a good starting point. For Azure, you could begin with AZ-900 and then work toward AZ-104. After that, look for cloud administrator or junior infrastructure roles, keep developing your skills, and use real work experience to qualify for engineering positions.
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UrbanWillow74: That route makes sense because junior infrastructure roles often provide the same foundational experience while setting clearer expectations for someone early in their career.