Maria Estela Godinez is currently studying high school in her hometown San Francisco del Rincón, México. She lives with her mother, a single parent, and five other siblings. Her passion is electronics and she is putting her passion to work for a good cause.
Maria Estela built a glove that allows speech-challenged people to move their fingers in a similar fashion to Braille language and have those signals recognized by software that converts them into speech.
She recently shared the stage with Intel Chairman, Craig R. Barrett, during his keynote at the Digital Leaders Forum as part of his Latin America trip. She won several awards for her project at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair this past Spring. (Official Intel Press Release here)
One of my blog readers, Ricardo Carreon, a blogger living in South America and working for Intel offered to translate an email interview I did with her in Spanish.
1. How did you get interested in electronics?
The Deyabú project forced me to learn more and more about electronics. The more I learned, the more I discovered how fascinating it was to me. At the beginning I drew my designs mixing things like protoboards and connection diagrams. I started to apply electronis without knowing exactly how they were used, but I was focused on trying to solve problems. Then in a summer course I learned how they were used, but really the interesting thing was to learn what happened when you applied electronics, in other words, the phenomenon that it produced. The more I know about electronics, the more passionate I get. It has grown on me spectacularly.
¿como te comenzaste a interesar en electrónica?
El proyecto Deyabú conforme comenzó, me exigía cada vez más electrónica, ahí la conocí y me resultó fascinante. Al inicio dibujaba el protoboard en lugar de dibujar/crear el diagrama de conexión, comencé por aplicarlos directamente sin saber porque solo lo utilizaba para resolver el problema, hasta que en un curso de verano aprendí para que se utilizaban, pero realmente lo interesante fue aprender el porqué se a aplicaban y qué era lo que sucedía, es decir, el fenómeno que lo producía. Entre más conozco de la electrónica, me sigue apasionando e interesando de una forma espectacular.
2. How did you come up with the idea for speech recognition software/hardware? What was your inspiration? Why the gloves?
I began developing this project under the direction of Jose Carlos Tovar, an engineer who was my coach and adviser. He had experience working on diverse projects directed to blind people, for example Darshan or PC Lazarillo. The conventional computers do most of their interaction in a visual form, so if we want computers to be useful to blind people we most adapt their software and hardware.
Inspiration:
My greatest motivation was not the award at all. It was the knowledge that I acquired when I was involved in the creation process. That discovery process can also help other people and this is what has inspired me to keep going.
Why the gloves?
Blind people use their sense of touch like one of their main senses. Blind people know the world by their hands because they use them for most of their activities.
Como dise con la idea de lenguaje en software y hardware?
Comencé en el desarrollo de proyectos gracias al ing. José Carlos Tovar, quien fue el asesor. Ahí han trabajado con diversos proyectos anteriormente también dirigidos a personas invidentes, por ejemplo Darshan PC Lazarillo.
La computadora convencional se muestran los procesos de forma visual, así que se debe aprovechar ls demás sentidos de los invidentes, y en ellos el oído y el tacto son primordiales para su conexión con el mundo, por esto es que debe adecuarse el software y hardware a las capacidades diferentes de las personas diferentes.
Qué ha sido tu inspiación?
En el proceso de la creación de un proyecto, he descubierto que la mayor aspiración/inspiración, no es llegar o subir a un podium, sino que esté es el conocimiento que adquieres cuando estás en el proceso de creación. Sabiendo qué este pueda ayudar a las demás personas.
Porqué los guantes?
Por como comentaba hace un momento, el invidente maneja e tacto como uno de los sentidos principales, y como el tacto es representado por las manos, y se puede decir que ellos
3. How much time did spend working on the project?
August 9th, 2005 to July 28th, 2006.
Cuanto tiempo trabajaste sobre el proyecto?
Desde el 9 de Agosto del 2005 hasta 28 de Julio de 2006
4. Was there a time when you thought "this won't work, I have to throw out my design and start over?"
Yes I did feel that way a lot of time. I felt uncertainty when constructing a project. But you see it, you feel it within you, and you cannot leave it. A project, since its begining is like a baby that needs to be nourished to grow. This close relationship with the project makes you stronger and gives the strength to move forward when things don't work out.
¿Había un tiempo cuándo pensó "esto no trabajará, yo tengo que tirar
mi plan y volver a empezar?" Siempre a cada momento, esa es la
incertidumbre que se juega al construir un proyecto. Pero lo ves, lo
sientes dentro de ti, y no lo puedes abandonar, ya que la creación de
un proyecto, se puede ver como un bebe que no puedes dejarlo solo en la
vida, que necesita de ti para crecer, y en ese momento piensas y
continuas con mayor fuerza.
5. What are your future plans?
My goal is to continue to development this project, to try to obtain greater good out of electronics, and to decide if it is the correct career path before entering the University.
Es proseguir en el desarrollo de proyectos, intentar obtener lo mayor posible de electrónica, y decidir si es la carrera correcta antes de entrar a la Universidad
6. What advice would you give to other young women who want to work on technology and electronics projects?
That they should never give up. If you reach a moment when you think it might be impossible to continue, you must see, think and to believe in everything that lies ahead. If you have the will to find a solution, there is not problem that can't be solved.
qué consejo daría usted a otras mujeres jóvenes que quieren trabajar en la tecnología y proyectos de la electrónica? Qué jamás se den por vencidos, que hay un instante en el cual parece ya no poder continuar, por esto debes ver, pensar y creer en todo lo que continúe adelante, no existe problema que no se pueda resolver.
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