Catapult Studios

Providing  access to education using an e-learning platform for deaf learners.

An estimated 4.44 million people in Kenya, or roughly 10% of the overall population, are Persons with disabilities. Approximately one-sixth of Kenya's disabled young people are able to continue studies beyond primary school. 

Illiteracy in Kenya is believe to be at 38% according to government records This margin widens by another 20%among the Deaf because of language barrier.Many of teachers of Deaf students are not competent and adequate equipped to teach Deaf students.At catapult we are offering Deaf students an online literacy individualised education plan that enables them read and write in English to enable them understand other subjects that are tested in English.It also connects Deaf students across the globe.

Catapult Studios has developed an E- learning platform that furnishes students with English articles, offering them the opportunity to practice new vocabulary and see its use and context through sign language video. The web application has a mobile application replica. This is mostly geared towards hearing parents with deaf children who are at the language acquisition phase. The web application is meant for students with a fairly good level of vocabulary and can read up to the high school level. Each student is tested to grade their literacy level and this determines the level of literature that they access. Once students do the assignment they can submit it to a tutor who is a teacher whom they are assigned to. The teachers then review the assignment and give the students clearance for the next cause/lesson.

From the interactions with this platform we can derive specific data that can be used to create individualised education plans for each students and inform schools and the government when it does education review. 

According to the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities active participation of persons with disabilities in the society is one of the basic human rights. The European strategy for persons with disabilities 2010-2020 recognises eight priority areas of action: These fundamental aspects impact the social fiber of every community in its effort to deliver disability mainstreaming.

Accessibility - urges people to make goods and services accessible to people with disabilities by removing buriers that don’t allow for access.

Right to participation - we should endeavour to ensure that people with disabilities enjoy all benefits of being citizens by removing barriers to life participation, businesses and leisure.

Equality - by innovating for this group that is often marginalised discriminated and underserved combats discrimination based on disability.

Social protection is an aspect that many people with disabilities don’t enjoy - in our work we plan to offer them solutions and services like interpreting to be able to access proper health services and engaging with them in social engagements within the community.

Our goals for social impact especially with the school going age set is to:

• Support to the possibility of personal access to information and knowledge.

• Support to learning and teaching. By working hand in hand with academic institutions and the government allows for a chance to give Deaf learners quality education that they can use to empower them.

• Support to personal communication and interaction.

• Support to administrative procedures in education. 

Globally e learning platforms have been used for different groups but we do not have an African based  e learning platform for Deaf learners.Our solution build on existing solutions but has be customised by giving it an African context and Kenya sign language assess.

In an era of ICT ,technology is an integral part of academic solutions.The use of technology will provide a possibility for teachers to create individualised education plans for their students and grading  without bias.It  offers data analytics for education reforms for the government and ministry of education.The use of Artificial intelligence will eliminate middle men and easy generation of content and reduce manpower.

In the coming year we plan to finish building the platform and do a pilot test in three counties.After this we will look to onboard paying users onto the platform with a minimum target of 300 students.we will then conduct a teacher  training in the three counties.There is need to partner with a local research institution which provides constant monitoring and evaluation on scale and depth of learning.

For the next two to five years we plan to have solid partnerships with academic institutions as well as having a complete tech team that will be able to meet the demand for tech solutions.We plan to onboard a user base of over 3000 students with different disabilities. As Africa ventures into disability mainstreaming we wish to place our selves at the centred of this offering our skills to mainstream disability by working with organisations and governments. 

Our major customers are schools and parents who will pay for the users to access the platform.Beneficiaries of our solution are Deaf learners and toddlers. Through visit and offering a free trial period we ill market the platform ms while providing a flexible subscription or licence fee>Users will access the platforms through hand held gadgets (tablets, phones) or laptop?computers.

We are currently doing our prototyping and MVP analysis with 200 student, four teachers in two institutions.They users are using this platform mainly to give us feedback on the user experience, intuitiveness and ease of accessibility. We then take into consideration the feedback and make appropriate changes.

In a years time we plan to have 500 deaf learners teachers in two  Deaf schools.In five years we project to have over 1500 paying users,35 teachers across five schools.We will give a license to the e learning platform and offering teacher training and induction for the pioneer group.After a years continued use of the platform we will be able to measure the impact and effects of using the platform by measuring study patterns, vocabulary  uptake and use.

The team consists of driven individuals with backgrounds in Special education, disability studies ,software development and business.The complimenting different skill sets enable us undertake different tusks.We also have mentors and volunteers who enable us reach different stake holders.

The business model is based on offering services through two different streams:

•Subscription, with:

–a basic offer “only services”

–A premium offer with “service plus device”

•To organise with partners

• Licensing, yearly fees for schools or organisation intending to manage the platform on “their own”

We are also looking into having a revenue share model between the teachers that take this up as extra work of after school activities as well as summer programs.

The values that Wise identifies with such as community development, research are very core to our value system as well. Most importantly it is our shared passion for education and technology that that makes wise a great match for us. As we start our journey we will benefit from the networks that Wise will afford as well as collaboration with other institutions. We will have an opportunity to share our experiences and challenges. 

Our biggest challenge is the platform development.As a startup have we one software developer who are working to build the solutions. We also need tech experts in Artificial Intelligence and machine learning which our team is not vast in.We are looking at partnerships and collaborations to enable us get skillsets we do not have.

Most of the schools and students do not have hardware that they can use to access this E learning platform.We plan to offer a device and licence solution.