In a small lab in Nairobi, a team of young engineers is building something that could transform education for deaf children across Africa.
ZeroBionic, co-founded by 22-year-old Norah Kimathi, has developed a mechanical hand that translates a teacher’s voice into sign language in real time, allowing deaf students to learn alongside their hearing peers.
The robotic arms are already in 78 schools across Kenya, with each hand costing roughly $350 and lasting up to two years. They boast a 92-percent speech-to-sign accuracy rate.
For pupils at Kasarani Treeside Secondary School for the Deaf, the technology offers something even more valuable: hope. Deaf teachers are using bodysuits to record and store signs, building a database of technical terms that have long been missing from local sign language.
Sharon Mumbe, a 19-year-old student, says the innovation gives her “hope for the future” and will help her “understand different concepts better”.
Kimathi says the team had to start from scratch because no standardized African sign language dataset existed. “We know we’re going to put a smile on someone else’s face,” she said.
