This project focused on improving mobility for a blind person by creating an obstacle and pit detecting walking stick using ultrasonic sensors. The project comprised of both hardware and software. The hardware consists of ultrasonic sensors, buzzers and a microcontroller, while the software consists of Arduino Integrated Development Environment (Arduino IDE), which was used to program the microcontroller. A Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) casing was used to house the hardware components. The ultrasonic sensor that detects obstacles was programmed to detect obstacles at a distance of 100 cm or below and causes the buzzer to sound so as to alert the blind person. Another ultrasonic sensor was programmed to identify pit at a depression of 18 cm and above. This stick was tested to detect obstacles by 80 different blindfolded individuals within a room with different objects placed at different positions. Results showed that the percentage reduction of collision rate when comparing the developed ultrasonic walking stick to a normal white cane is 90.1%. This shows that the ultrasonic walking stick is reliable for domestic use by a blind person. Keywords— Arduino, ATmega328 Microcontroller, Blind walking stick, Mobility aid, Smart cane, Ultrasonic sensor.

As computing education grows rapidly across the globe, there is an increasing need to broaden participation and engage all students in computing, particularly those from underrepresented groups and developing countries. To address this need, a programming workshop that uses various interventions to broaden participation was set up to empower African university students with computer programming skills. Out of 487 applications, 172 participants from 11 African countries were selected to participate in the workshop. This paper aims to explore the participants' experiences, including their motivation for attending the workshop, their programming skills confidence, what they found most useful for their learning, and the challenges they faced. Employing a mixed-methods design, our quantitative and qualitative results indicate that participants' motivations were more intrinsic. Further, the results indicate that participants' confidence increased after the workshop. They found the hands-on sessions with the tutors to be most beneficial to their learning. We also observed that many participants struggled with access to basic ICT resources during the workshop, even with the internet data provided for them. Our findings highlight that participants are interested in learning programming and that it is important for collaborative efforts to provide relevant teaching interventions, resources, and support for them.