SOFTBANK MOBILE and the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology of the University of Tokyo jointly carry out Aki-chan's Magic Pocket Project to utilize mobile phone functions to facilitate the learning and social participation of children with cognitive or communicative impairment. In November 2009 the two organizations published Aki-chan's 99 Magic Pockets —A Manual for Using Mobile Phones to Assist Learning of Children with Special Needs— a booklet of case studies conducted over a period of six months. The project also promotes a variety of educational activities including seminars throughout the nation. In January 2011, Magic Pen Case Project started to carry out case studies of learning assistance utilizing iPad for children with special needs. The Project called on schools for children with special needs to participate to verify the educational effectiveness of iPad which is lent for free of charge for a year. The results from the project will be shown to the public to promote learning assistance for children with special needs.

SOFTBANK MOBILE supports DO-IT Japan, a university entrance program run by the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology to support high school students and graduates with special needs. The program aims to help the students develop the capability to think and make choices by themselves to realize goals such as attending college. SOFTBANK MOBILE organized a work-experience program where the participants of DO-IT Japan program developed tariff plan and CM plan in fiscal 2010.

Please refer to the links below for more details.

• Aki-chan's Magic Pocket Project: using mobile phones to assist learning of children with special needs (Japanese only)
• Aki-chan's Magic Pen Case Project: providing learning assistance to children with special needs (Japanese only)
• Notice regarding the publication of Aki-chan's 99 Magic Pockets, a booklet of examples of how mobile phone can support the learning of children with special needs (SOFTBANK MOBILE Corp.) (Japanese only)
• Schools to participate Magic Pencil Case Project、a learning assistance program using iPad for children with special needs (SOFTBANK Group) (Japanese only)
• DO-IT Japan, a university entrance program to support high school students and graduates with special needs (Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology of the University of Tokyo) (Japanese only)

In an effort to provide equal rights to information to the hearing impaired^*1, since fiscal 2008, SOFTBANK MOBILE has been lending mobile handsets to the Nagano Summarize Center, a non-profit organization, to help them experiment and develop a system that displays the content spoken in public speeches such as lectures summarized by interpreters in remote locations.

Since fiscal 2009, SOFTBANK MOBILE together with Tsukuba University of Technology, other universities and NPOs, have been applying this system, the Mobile Remote Information Relay System, to real situations on an experimental basis. Trials have been conducted at lessons at elementary schools, junior high schools and universities. The system was put into real operation over 200 times at meetings held within the three telecommunications companies of the SOFTBANK Group. Through these trials, developers were able to generate a list of remaining issues to be solved. In addition, SOFTBANK MOBILE has been working to promote the concept of equal rights to information using mobile phones by publicly inviting monitors for this system. In November 2010, Mobile Remote Information Relay System was awarded the Grand Prize at the 7th Partnership Awards held by Partnership Supprot Center, an NPO coporation, for the 3-party collaboration of NPO, academia and business.

Please refer to the links below for more details.

• Mobile Remote Information Relay System —helping the hearing impaired to learn by displaying speech captions on mobile phone screens (Japanese only)
• Results of introductory experiments of the Mobile Remote Information Relay System (National University Corporation Tsukuba University of Technology) (Japanese only)
• Mobile Remote Information Relay System won the Grand Prize at the 7th Partnership Awards (SOFTBANK MOBILE Corp.) (Japanese only)

SOFTBANK MOBILE operates the SoftBank Sign Language Class, where native signers (hearing-impaired people whose native language is Japanese Sign Language) trained in the theory and practice of linguistic education give lessons of Japanese Sign Language, which is a unique linguistic system differing from the Japanese language. There are two kinds of courses: one for beginners and another for those who have previously learned Japanese sign language. Both courses have several classes at different levels. Lessons are carried out without using voice at all but only with Japanese sign language to help learners naturally pick up the sign language.

In an effort to develop instructors of sign language, since fiscal 2005, SOFTBANK MOBILE has held seminars teaching methodology of sign language^*2 for teachers to learn a wide range of knowledge necessary for teaching sign language. A Family Class (free of charge) is also offered for families with hearing impaired children to support their communication at home. The number of participants at SoftBank's Sign Language Class lessons exceeded 4,800^*3 in total.

Please refer to the links below for more details.

• The SoftBank Sign Language Class —for richer communication at home and in society (Japanese only)
• The SoftBank Sign Language Class (SOFTBANK MOBILE) (Japanese only)