Hastu Wijayasri: Indonesia’s First Difable Woman Developer
“If you really want to do something, you’ll find a way. If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse.” — Jim Rohn
Hastu Wijayasri had no idea what coding or code programming was at first. Hastu, a student majoring in Informatics Engineering at UIN Sunan Kalijaga Yogyakarta, also struggled with studying at first. Hastu is one of the students with a speech and hearing disability. Unexpectedly, her journey to motivate other disabled friends starts here.
Hastu created an application that is also intended for her other disabled friends. SukaCare is the name of the application he created alongside Tesya, the leader of DSC (Developer Student Club) at her campus. Hastu created SukaCare to make it easier for her disabled friends to attend lectures. Many persons with disabilities struggle to cope with the learning process due to a lack of mentors and different methods of mentoring rather than non-disabled people.
Hastu said that she experienced the benefits of the Google Developer class in addition to designing an application named “SukaCare” with her mentor, Tesya, to support individuals with disabilities. Sunan Kalijaga, where Hastu and Tesya studied, inspired the name “Suka.” This program provides an interactive platform for students with disabilities, particularly blind people at UIN, to more readily access lecture materials. Since 2017, she has improved her learning to speak English, learning about the latest technology breakthroughs, and then having the opportunity to travel California to complete a short course through Google Developer courses.
“Through the application, my friends can ask volunteers to read material books requested by the lecturer. Then volunteers will send audio recordings of reading materials as requested to them,” she explained.
This application has not totally finished and is still in the development process. Tesya claims that the volunteer application has reached 95 percent and 70 percent for the disabled application has been completed. For now, this application is currently in the internal testing process. The target, according to Tesya, is that Sukacare will be displayed in the Android application store. Sukacare’s interface was also modified because it was created for the visually impaired. The microphone button has been made larger to fill the screen, and minimum wording has been added to ease the users.
Despite the difficulties in hearing and speaking, for Hastu those are not an obstacle. Hastu’s participation in the organization inspired her to create something useful for other disabled friends, one of which was an application that she has made. Her passion has skyrocketed until now, owing to her commitment to change the future of her friends so that they might have the same opportunities in the world of work.
Hastu has shown that helping others can be vitally important and at the least very delightful. How many people have you helped until now? Follow Girls Kode Medium for other inspiring figures!
Written by Rania Salsabila
References:
Pertiwi, Wahyunanda Kusuma. 2018. Mengenal Hastu Wijayasri, Sosok Programer Perempuan Difabel Indonesia. [online]. Tersedia dalam https://tekno.kompas.com/read/2018/12/06/20120087/mengenal-hastu-wijayasri-sosok-programer-perempuan-difabel-indonesia?page=all (Diakses pada 20 September 2021)
Ramadhany, Rahmi. 2019. Hastu Wijayasri, Developer Tuli Pertama Indonesia. [online]. Tersedia dalam https://www.solider.id/baca/5462-hastu-wijayasri-developer-tuli-pertama-indonesia (Diakses pada 20 September 2021)
