Penza, 4 July 2014. PenzaNews. First presentations of projects by the participants of the social development project for free education of young programmers IT-laboratory “Summer - 2014” took place in Penza business incubator on Thursday, July 3.

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As one of the co-organizers of the event, General Director of JSC “Center of cluster development” Mikhail Lyashkov told news agency “PenzaNews,” during the first day of the IT-lab, six teams of programmers, designers and marketers were formed.

According to him, in addition to working on projects, everyone could participate in master classes and workshops, one of which — “Start In Garage” — was held for Penza residents by the representatives of IT-park from Naberezhnye Chelny.

As the deputy head of IT-park of Naberezhnye Chelny Lenar Khalikov explained, the training was held in Penza for three days, after which all participants of the lab shared the information about their projects with the mentors online.

“If there is a necessity to make some corrections, we are coming to to Penza in a month again. If all goes well, then by the end of the completion of IT-lab participants, we may bring some funds and other experts here to review the projects,” Lenar Khalikov noted.

Speaking generally about the organization of IT-lab in Penza, he said that students receive invaluable real-life experience.

In addition, he said, this is a good opportunity for specialists to get employed by a large IT-company, meet and socialize with each other.

“This kind of activity is also interesting because here a person who does not know how to program, can gather a team and make a quality product. For programmers this is something new,” he added.

“The guys here are what we call the “cut-in-type,” they react fast enough, and now many of them have changed their initial thoughts about their projects. I think 30-40% of the participants will bring their ideas accurately at least until the realization,” he stressed.

Initiator and organizer of IT-lab, the leader of Penza association of software developers “Secon” Maksim Semenkin explained that this year the keynote of the projects is their social orientation.

“There is a project “Social taxi,” which allows people to find a lift in a rush hour and get from one point of the city to another. Also there is “Diary of treatment” project, which carries medical prescriptions in a smartphone. Also we are working on a project of volunteer fire-extinguishing society — the quest for children during which they will get skills of treating fire, and a number of other developments,” Maksim Semenkin said.

The chairman of the government of the Penza region Yuri Krivov acquainted with the work of students of IT-lab and praised the social component of the projects.

“Higher education is always a certain patina of academism and lack of practical orientation, the students came here themselves, voluntarily, at the invitation of a number of companies of IT-cluster with support from the Center of cluster development of the Penza region. First, they find each other here and form a team, which is especially important for business innovation, and secondly, they work in the conditions specified by the real sector of the economy which they intend to enter in the future in various capacities,” the head of the regional government said.

“I think that in such integrative models of training, competitive specialists and businessmen aimed at creating surplus value will be formed,” Yuri Krivov summed up.