Ugandan IT student Andrew Njuki spent years hunched over English-language textbooks; often grappling with material that would have been easier to grasp in his mother tongue Luganda.
As of May, the 27-year-old has been able to copy-paste his online teaching materials into Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O); Google translation service and read them directly in Uganda’s official language Luganda, spoken by millions across the east African country but not taught in schools.
“To understand something better you need to first understand it in your mother tongue,” said Njuki, who also finds the service handy for surfing the internet and social media.
It is not perfect, he said, he rates it around 60% for quality and 65% for accuracy. But it is a start.