Inventor: Celia Beron
Invention: Ref for the Deaf
Inventor’s Location: Richardson, TX, USA

There are many deaf athletes who are great soccer players. But so far, they had the problem of not being able to hear the sound of a referee’s whistle or starter gun.
And Celia Beron, a soccer player, had noticed it herself, multiple times. On one occasion, she noticed that one of her teammates who had a hearing disability kept playing after everyone else stopped. So, every time a coach blew his whistle to stop, her team members had to wave their arms in front of her face to get her to stop.
Now, this 13 year old eighth-grader from Richardson (Texas) has invented Ref for the Deaf, a special bracelet that vibrates. The invention pairs up a transmitter with a referee’s whistle or starter gun. When either of them goes off, the transmitter sends a signal to the receiver: a vibrating bracelet worn by the athlete.
Her father (Kurt Beron) and two graduate students (Timothy Gutschlag and Jonathan Hoak) from the University of Texas at Dallas helped her to design the product. She got the patent for “Ref for the Deaf” around 2007 February. And a plan based on her invention won the top prize at a University of Texas, Dallas contest for new business ideas in November. Celia left school for a day this fall to help sell her idea to judges. She and the UTD students split their $10,000 prize money.
Her invention should help the thousands of deaf athletes as well as the Special Olympics athletes. Also, Ref for the Deaf could be the difference between a win or a loss for many teams with deaf athletes.
Now, Celia’s father and her “invention partners” are trying to study the market options and the viability of starting a business together based on their invention.