JEDDAH — Two 14-year-olds who had made their mark with an eye-catching project for special needs persons are now being chased by private companies to produce their 3D camera for visually impaired. Renad Aqad and Einas Khourshid, both from Jeddah, are just thrilled at the prospect of taking their invention to the masses. Both Aqad and Khourshid had won the Jeddah part of the Kingdomwide competition, organized by King Abdul Aziz and his Companions Foundation for Gifted (Mawhiba) in cooperation with the Ministry of Education, with their 3D camera. A chance visit to the Society for Visually Impaired (Ibsar) and the Institute for Visually Impaired prompted both these teens to work on this project. Aqad said, “They realized (after the visit) that the majority of the visually impaired preferred isolation from society because they are ‘shy of using the white stick' or because the available aids for the partially blind or blind are expensive.” The girls, once the decision was made, named their project “Let Them Realize!” and addressed the problems facing visually impaired individuals in the Kingdom. Their 3D-camera proposal helps blind people be more involved in society. The colorful and small 3D camera can be worn as a brooch and is linked to the ear through a headphone. “The visually impaired person can then be introduced to everything that's going on around him,” said Aqad. “The technology used in this 3D-camera is topnotch and we were not able to produce it, but we have provided a detailed plan of what is needed for our invention to see the light,” said Aqad. “It's our luck that some private companies are willing to take our project into consideration,” added Aqad. The two girls called for providing centers for innovation at schools to help discover talent and enhance skills. “The family support and teachers' encouragement cannot be neglected,” said Aqad. Theirs was the winning project in Jeddah and is one of the 25 projects on the shortlist in the Kingdomwide competition. Over 500 projects were presented in the competition. The winners are to be announced a few months later.
