ReadUp: one reading-assessment platform, many languages
- Client:
- Platform built by Western Sydney University in collaboration with Neurabuild.
- Collaborators:
- WSU, International Centre for Neuromorphic Systems; Neurabuild; Deployed with Funda Wande and AI for Education (South Africa) and EdTech Hub (Pakistan)
The problem
Reading assessment is manual and locked to one language at a time. To assess at scale you need a platform that runs on cheap devices, works without a reliable internet connection, captures clean child-speech data, and can move to a new language without being rebuilt.
Our approach
ReadUp is offline-first and runs on ordinary phones and tablets. A child taps to record, hears their answer played back, and can re-record or move on. Recordings sync and are AI-scored when a connection is available. A purpose-built marking interface lets human markers label recordings at scale, the labelling layer that produced hundreds of thousands of training labels in the South African work. Architecture led by Dawid Loubser, development led by Graham Withey, built embedded with the WSU research team.
Outcome
The same platform has been deployed in South Africa in Sepedi and isiXhosa for EGRA-AI, and in Pakistan in Urdu and English with EdTech Hub, led by Nawaz Aslam, Pakistan Country Lead. One product, new languages and countries, without starting over each time.