In the last two years, the problem of employment of graduates of IT schools has become especially acute. Experts from the IT industry and HR directors of IT companies note a shortage of specialists at the middle and senior levels. At the same time, novice specialists (junior) with the current level of training, who graduate from IT schools, are not in demand in the labor market. A paradox arises: despite the shortage of IT specialists, the market is oversaturated with juniors who cannot find work.

We have launched the project "From junior to junior+", which helps our novice specialists gain the necessary experience and increase their value in the labor market.

The idea of the project was born in the process of communicating with startup teams. All of them face two main problems: lack of funds and manpower. We realized that the lack of money is due to the inability to pay for the work of the necessary specialists. It is this need that our graduates could satisfy.

We have developed a questionnaire for startups and sent it to potential participants. Of those who took the survey, we selected two startups that were particularly in need of labor, but did not have a budget to pay for it. We provided each of these startups with a specialized team of our juniors under the guidance of a teacher (team leader) for two months. During this time, the team worked for free.

Two months later, one of the startups completely took over our junior team, officially employing them, since during this time they found an investor. The second startup hired two people on a permanent basis, and we recommended the remaining two juniors to the HR director of the IT company, attaching to the resume a description of their tasks and achievements during their work on the startup. As expected, they were hired by an IT company.

Thus, we were able to solve the problem of the employment of our graduates by making the project "From junior to junior+" permanent. Our employee continues to analyze requests from startups and forms specialized teams for them from our students and teachers.

The Junior to Junior+ program has been successfully launched in Belarus and has already shown its effectiveness. We hope to expand its geography and plan to launch the program in Kazakhstan in the fall of 2024. This will allow even more of our graduates to gain valuable experience and find decent employment.