Sign-ify wins Rep. Andy Biggs’s 2025 Congressional App Challenge in Arizona’s Fifth District
Rep. Andy Biggs has named Nicholas Ong and Aarav Deshmane of BASIS Chandler as the winners of the 2025 Congressional App Challenge in Arizona’s Fifth District. Their app Sign-ify translates American Sign Language (ASL) into different spoken languages, bridging the gap between sign language and verbal communication across different languages.
When asked what inspired the creation of Sign-ify, the students said, “When I was visiting my grandmother, I was told she was losing her hearing. Basic communication with her became very hard, so she had to get hearing aids, which we were fortunately able to afford. However, it really dawned on me just how many people out there would not be able to communicate with their loved ones. In our very busy lives, it is very hard to make time for learning ASL, let alone having two people do it, and even then, people might not even have the opportunity available for them nearby. Furthermore, not many people globally know ASL, so everyday life for those deaf or hard of hearing becomes nearly impossible.
“Rather than needing to write down every single statement, we decided to make a more feasible approach, an app that would just directly translate ASL to any other language. With more than 70 million individuals worldwide who are deaf, we saw the urgent need for the creation of a solution to bridge the gap between sign language and verbal communication across multiple languages. Through our own experiences and understanding of how deeply auditory impairments affect people’s daily lives, we were inspired to create Sign-ify, a solution designed to make communication more inclusive and accessible.”
The 2025 Congressional App Challenge marked another record-setting year for the program. A total of 394 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives hosted App Challenges in their congressional districts, the highest level of participation in the program’s history. More than 13,800 students from across the country participated, submitting over 4,600 original apps focused on real-world challenges ranging from health and accessibility to education, sustainability, and civic engagement.
The Congressional App Challenge is an official initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives that encourages middle school and high school students to learn to code, explore computer science, and build practical technology solutions for their communities. Each participating Member of Congress selects a winning app from their district, and winning teams are invited to showcase their projects to Members of Congress, staff, and industry leaders at the annual #HouseOfCode celebration on Capitol Hill.
The Challenge is proudly bipartisan and reflects a shared commitment to expanding access to STEM education and preparing the next generation of American innovators for the future workforce. The program is a public-private partnership made possible through funding from the Broadcom Foundation, AWS, Infosys Foundation USA, theCoderSchool, Apple, and others.
The 2026 Congressional App Challenge will launch in May, and eligible students can pre-register for the competition now.