GDI Hub’s Centre for Digital Language Inclusion (CDLI) co-creation sesison
GDI Hub’s Centre for Digital Language Inclusion (CDLI) is running an innovation sprint in Kenya, bringing together university teams, innovators, and mentors to co-create inclusive technologies using non-standard speech data. Building on learnings from the Ghana edition, this hackathon will culminate in a finale in November with top teams developing real-world MVPs, using ASRs trained on the voice samples that have been collected by the CDLI in collaboration with Senses Hub. With structured mentoring, stakeholder consultations, and user empowerment workshops, the initiative is designed to ensure that persons with speech impairments are not just represented but meaningfully involved in shaping solutions. The final prototypes aim to bridge accessibility gaps in communication and digital participation.
As part of this journey, a co-creation workshop, hosted at Kenya Institute of Special Education (KISE), brought together participants, mentors, and facilitators for a full day of collaboration on inclusive Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) solutions. The day began with networking and an icebreaker led by Bessy Mukaria, followed by opening remarks from Wambui Phidelis on behalf of Senses Hub, Madam Lizbeth from KISE, and a speech from KISE Director Dr. Norman Kiogora, delivered by Zachary Nyange Mwasia.
A standout moment was Madam Sarah’s powerful story as a person with cerebral palsy, which underscored the need for inclusive solutions. This was followed by a video from the CDLI’s Dr Richard Cave that framed the challenge of ASR inclusion and its potential impact. Technical insights were then shared by Zachary Nyange, who emphasised the importance of designing solutions from the user’s perspective.
Throughout the day, participants pitched ideas across the Product, Model, and Research tracks, receiving feedback from the KISE team, speech therapists, and CDLI mentors. After lunch, speech therapists Wambui and Frank Njenga facilitated a session on speech-language pathology to guide future work.
The workshop was intentionally designed to bridge technical innovation with lived realitiesnbringing together participants, mentors, facilitators, and individuals with direct experience of speech impairments. This approach grounded the development of inclusive ASR solutions in empathy, practicality, and user-centred design.