RCT - Winners of the II Hack4Edu in collaboration with the Telefónica Chairs Network

Telefónica congratulates all of the winning projects in the second edition of the international hackathon Hack4Edu organised from the Telefónica Chair - Pontifical University of Salamanca and in which also participated their Telefónica Chairs of the Universities of Salamanca and Deusto. We would like to thank these three universities for their collaboration with this great initiative to help digital education in the most vulnerable environments!

For 3 days, 130 hackers from 6 countries and 12 Spanish and Latin American universities worked in multidisciplinary teams in a hybrid format to come up with solutions to the challenges of digital education. A digital “Pasapalabra” against illiteracy and an app for the learning of students with hearing disabilities, among the winning projects in #hack4edu (Inclusive projects adapted to vulnerable environments, awarded in #hack4edu | ProFuturo.

#hack4edu is an initiative of «ProFuturo” y the Pontifical University of Salamanca (UPSA) in collaboration with the Telefónica Chairs Network.

Award-winning projects 

In the Senior category, which awards two prizes of €1,000, one has been awarded to ex aequo (with an endowment of 500 € each) to one team of the Pontifical University of Salamanca (UPSA) and another from the Technological University of Panama. The first one presents a tool that detects students' emotions by means of deep learning to improve the development of classes and make them more dynamic and attractive; and the second proposes the construction of a web prototype capable of translating Panamanian sign language with artificial intelligence. Regarding the latter, called Signspa, The jury emphasised that it can contribute to the inclusion of people with hearing problems in the world of education.

In the same category, a prize of €1,000 was also awarded to the project of the University of Salamanca (USAL) Words4All, developed by a team of teachers and students from the fields of health, education and computer science. Their proposal consists of an app based on the world-renowned Pasapalabra which, using disruptive technologies such as voice recognition, addresses illiteracy and promotes learning through the use of gamification.

In the Innovative mode, The first prize, worth €1,000, went to a team from the University of Salamanca (USAL) for the project Hear4All. It is an app that translates different languages and dialects into sign language in real time to improve the educational experience of deaf people. The jury highlighted its quality, its focus on a real problem and its potential for future development. In the same category, the following projects were awarded second prize (€700) and third prize (€500), respectively E-Señas, of the Instituto Federal Catarinense of Brazil, y Listudents, of the Pontifical University of Salamanca (UPSA). The first proposes an intelligent virtual platform to help deaf students in their learning and the second proposes a 180-degree turn to the traditional method of roll call, with an app that allows them to do it automatically thanks to NFC technology (Near Field Communication), thus saving time for students and teachers.

In addition, the promoters of the project “The aid decision”.”, from the Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca (UPSA), have received two free enrolments to study for the Título Propio de Experto en Big Data of the same university. The aim of this award is to recognise work that has been developed with data and has managed to extract value from the information. The proposal recognised in this case is a programme based on the development of a scorecard that allows organisations and governments to establish criteria for allocating educational aid more effectively.

A second edition with a higher level and in hybrid format

The organisers of the hackathon, promoted by ProFuturo and the UPSA with the collaboration of the Telefónica Chairs Network, point out the qualitative leap in this second edition. “The level is becoming more and more professional. We are seeing projects and prototypes that really respond to a need. This year the participants have surpassed themselves and there has been a great involvement of students, professors, etc., who have formed a diversity of mixed teams, with different skills and nationalities, including collaboration between Latin American and Spanish sites, but also between Spanish ones”, says Manuel José Ruiz García, manager of data analytics at ProFuturo and coordinator of #hack4edu.