BYU Students Make Glasses to Help Autistic Kid's Eye Contact

Heidi Kershaw was sitting in on a therapy session with her 7-year-old son, who has autism, when she noticed he kept getting distracted from the therapy exercises.

His eyes were glued to the corner of the room, where Mickey Mouse was on the TV.

If only there were an image of Mickey Mouse on her face, the mom told the therapist, she would finally be able to establish eye contact with her son.

Kershaw, who is the senior vice president of operations at the Entertainment Industry Foundation in Los Angeles, kept the thought with her and came up with an idea: a pair of glasses that stream digital content on the lenses, allowing parents or therapists to keep eye contact with nonverbal children with autism.

After getting turned down by engineering firms who told her the glasses would cost about $1 million to design and develop, Kershaw pitched the idea to the Brigham Young University Engineering Capstone program, in which senior students undergo a two-semester project related to mechanical, manufacturing, electric or computer engineering.