The article deals with the main results of scientific research devoted to the question of theoretical bases of diversification of penitentiary educational system in institutions of confinement.The urgency of scientific research reveals through the social importance of convicts’ education.The article draws attention to the fact that the problem of diversification of penitentiary educational system hasn’t been considered in pedagogy yet. It also identifies the main contradictions, tasks and methods of scientific research.Retrospective analysis of criminal system inRussiahelps to define the existing tendencies of convicts’ education, unsolved problems in this field of science and formulate perspective ideas to modernize the penitentiary educational system.The item tells about the main point of diversification of penitentiary educational system and presents it in a model. It gives detailed analysis of model’s components and depicts some practical ways of its embodiment in institutions of confinement. Moreover the article describes the determinants of diversification of penitentiary educational system which are seemed to be the factors and conditions of its effective development.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12731/2218-7405-2013-6-20