The Sunday Mail
Youth Buzz
Phillipa Mukome-Chinhoi
IN 2022, when Rutendo Gandi (19) was pursuing her Advanced Level studies at Zengeza 1 High School in Chitungwiza, she came up with an educational digital application to assist people with visual and hearing impairments.
Dubbed “Essentials Technologies”, the application assists the deaf by translating text to audio, or vice-versa, in a classroom or work situation.
It enables users to communicate and interact, and has features such as animations to enhance the educational material.
Although she is able-bodied, Rutendo had a burning ambition to help people living with disabilities because she was born and raised at a rehabilitation centre in Beatrice, where her mother is a motor mechanic instructor for students with various impairments.
Rutendo’s efforts began in 2020, at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Using an old computer, she developed an offline education software application that aided learners in marginalised communities to continue with their studies despite restrictions to physical learning.
The application provides the learner with tutorials, animated diagrams, a calculations platform, question-and-answer activities and a note-storing platform, among other features.
This came in handy for learners in remote areas, who also had no internet services, and others who could not afford mobile data to access online learning.
“I am a young developer, who is interested in the technical aspects of programming and coding but I am also into building applications and platforms powered by machine learning algorithms and data.
“l developed an application to help disabled learners to detect and read multimedia content in text, voice and image. I exhibited the app at different national events. As a young innovator, I am critically aware of the role that young people need to play in helping to navigate the complex world of innovation,” she said.
The application will be updated with the passage of time to accommodate changes and additions in the syllabus.
She has made presentations on the application to the Ministry of Information Communication Technology, Postal and Courier Services, and that of Primary and Secondary Education.
Because of her innovation, she has been invited to conferences such as one hosted by the Research Council of Zimbabwe, UNICEF and Midlands State University recently.
She is bent on building technologies that promote social good and inclusion of the less able in mainstream education.
Through her innovation, she is also promoting Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) foundational skills among the youth, which include coding, basic numeracy, literacy and problem-solving skills.
She engages her peers through offline and online games like chess, interactive artificial intelligence, sport and music.
“Engaging young people through these activities suffocates boredom and injects competitive learning. I realised that one day, my applications would help solve some of Africa’s critical social challenges.”
A computer science undergraduate student at the Arrupe Jesuit University in Zimbabwe, Gandi’s efforts with the applications began to bear fruit when she engaged a mentor, who advised her that she needed to be rooted in an ecosystem of other co-developers and scientists. She then linked up with STEM-oriented groups.
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