Labor Shortage in Armenia

Yes folks, it's not a mistake, there IS a labor shortage in Armenia. Despite all the unemployment, there is a demand for people with certain skills that is not being met. I have seen it at previous jobs trying to hire Armenians with excellent English skills, and personally when trying to find someone to work on my websites with decent English and computer skills (still looking)... today there was an article on Armenialiberty about the shortage of skilled programmers in Armenia, something I had heard about for years. There are not enough students in the courses offered at universities, and the level of education is not high enough for the graduates. Here is a link to the article.

If you want to teach a man to fish, instead of giving him fish every day, this is a perfect opportunity for a large project. A non-profit vocational school to teach computer programming to Armenians. Staff/instructors are a combo of paid and volunteer. Students are admitted based on some tests, and taught on a student loan bases in something like a 1 year program, and then pay back the costs of their education over time with the jobs the education should lead to... simple, sustainable, encourages a clean industry with high salaries, immediately fills needs for jobs... how perfect is it? And once a place has a good pool of programmers and software companies, the whole thing feeds upon itself and grows and local innovation and business takes off.