Free internship for developers has opened in Karaganda

In Karaganda, iSynip, an educational program where aspiring IT specialists receive free training from experienced developers, has launched. Interns with the best results already in the second month of training get the opportunity to test their skills in a real-world project under the supervision of experienced mentors and a professional team.

The internship takes place at the Karaganda-based outsourcing IT company QAZDEVELOP, which is part of the GEXABYTE group of companies. It is conducted by developers from the team who possess the technical competencies required for training and have experience implementing projects from America, Europe, and the CIS.

The program includes training and practice in the Java 8/11/17 programming language, using frameworks and libraries such as Spring Framework, Spring Boot, Spring Security, Spring MVC, JPA/Hibernate, JDBC, PostgreSQL, Elasticsearch, Lombok, MapStruct/ModelMapper, and more.

iSynip launched in May of this year, with eight interns completing the training in the first cohort. Now, during the launch of the third stream, 70 applications for participation have been received from Karaganda alone. When developing the program, the authors focused on the demand for specific technologies among clients:

Anastasia Gruzgina, Coordinator of the iSynip educational program

The demand for IT specialties is huge. We receive applications from students of specialized faculties and those who come to IT from other professions. The best interns get the opportunity to complete their internship in a real client project.

This is a significant advantage for beginners, as employers are always looking for developers with experience. Everyone who completed the program has already found employment. This is because we teach what is relevant: these are not meetups and lectures, but skills needed in work right now.

The program's methodology is unconventional: most of the training is built on independent work. This is a conscious decision by the authors, as development requires heightened concentration, patience, self-discipline, and it is better for interns to develop these skills immediately.

However, the presence of mentors allows interns not to get stuck on difficult questions for long. If a student hits a dead end, the mentor provides direction on where to look for answers. Thus, beginner developers learn to analyze problems, formulate questions correctly, and find working solutions.

Kuanys Kaimoldin, Tech Lead and Java Developer at QAZDEVELOP IT company, mentor of the iSynip educational program

Today, in commercial development, there is a huge number of frameworks, libraries, methodologies, and architectural solutions. Therefore, we do not teach ready-made solutions but introduce students to the main concepts. This helps in further analyzing task requirements, understanding which tools will be needed for execution, and being able to familiarize themselves with ready-made solutions that already exist in the world.

The main skill a developer should possess is the ability to search for answers on Google. Because clients expect maximum efficiency, it is important not to try to reinvent the wheel but to use solutions that have been proven by time and thousands of other programmers.

Nikita Shapovalov, student at Abilkas Saginov Karaganda Technical University, completed training at iSynip in June

In six months, I grew from an intern to a Java developer on the team's staff. The internship was a good start for me. I gained skills that help me not to get lost in the vast amount of code, resources, and third-party services, but to gradually and purposefully immerse myself in the project. Thanks to the training, I was able to develop in the environment of strong specialists who allowed me to try, make mistakes, and guide me through difficult moments. All this leads to rapid growth in a short time, which is critically important in the IT field.

To get into the free internship, you need to know the principles of object-oriented programming (OOP), the basics of the Java language, and understand how the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) is structured and works. You also need to pass a social and technical interview. Participation in the program was previously offline only; now an online format has been added for interns from other cities.

According to the Association of Digital Transformation, which conducts research in the information technology industry, 83 out of 122 universities in the country provide IT training.

The Center for Labor Resources Development of Kazakhstan also notes that only 31% of graduates who received IT specialties in Kazakh universities in 2019-2021 are working in their field. The rest have either chosen another sphere or their skills do not meet the requirements of IT companies.

Aleksandra Molchanovskaya, Managing Director of the Center for Labor Resources Development

This is a rather low indicator, considering the high demand for developers. Digital transformation today covers every enterprise, and IT specialists are in demand in all industries, not just in the field of information and communication technologies. Experts note an acute shortage of IT workers in the country and that the education system does not produce specialists with skills relevant to employers. Therefore, private schools are the solution. They are practice-oriented and prepare a beginner programmer in three to six months. Currently, middle and senior developers are in demand, who will train and support junior developers.

If a person is ready to develop in the IT field, then programming schools are an excellent step at the beginning of a career. According to our research, the average monthly salary of an ICT specialist in Kazakhstan is 516,000 tenge.

More details on the IT market research can be found in the National Report "Labor Market of Kazakhstan: On the Path to Digital Reality" on the website.