Correctional colonies - a new forge of cadres of IT-specialists?

In an interview with Izvestia, the head of the press service of the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian Federation for the Moscow Region, Regina Rzhevtseva, shared her plans to open four monthly courses for inmates of the Mozhaisk penal colony. These courses will include the professions of a programmer, photo editor and graphic designer. Experts believe that such measures will help improve the situation with the employment of prisoners after release. So, as places on these courses will be limited, their attendance will be a kind of encouragement for the inhabitants of the colony.

The FSIN of the region concluded a tripartite agreement with the Ministry of Education of the region, a charitable foundation that initiated this idea, Rzhevtseva said. - The overall goal of the new program is to train pupils of the colony in specialties that are now in demand in the market, so that after they are released, it will be easier for them to adapt to the new free life. Therefore, the FPS also closely cooperates with specialists of the Ministry of Labor and Employment, who regularly come to the colonies to talk about which specialties are most relevant. In accordance with their forecast, courses in various specialties will be prepared. Already developed a program for IT-direction. It is assumed that, by analogy, culinary courses and courses for stylists will be held.

In my opinion, the main problem may be the traditional reluctance of the employer to hire people who have previous convictions. The quality of the material that will be taught on such rapid courses is also in doubt.
When deciding on the organization of such training, they were guided by the results of a survey among prisoners. Nikolay Levshits, executive director of the charity foundation “Stretch out your hand”, which deals with the implementation of the project together with the FPS, said:

“We conducted a survey of children, in the framework of which they offered 10–15 specialties in demand on the market and asked them to choose no more than three,” said Levshits. - We proceeded from what skills will be useful to them in later life. Most of this is true for those who have a short time, because those who have been sentenced for a long time are simply forced to study the specialties that already exist in the colony, as they need to work in the production at the zone. And then no one asks if you want to be an auto mechanic or a seamstress or not. Computer, the basics of programming - this is what is interesting for young people and may be needed at any job. It is also worth understanding that, in turn, the cook, the hairdresser are those specialties where they do not check the conviction for employment, for the guys it is more than relevant. If the experiment succeeds, it will be possible to introduce training in new specialties in other colonies on an ongoing basis.

I would like to know your opinion about this initiative.