Voxy’s Demonstrated Outcomes Impacting the Lives of Refugees

Using a proven methodology and a cutting edge web-based platform, Voxy is improving the language skills of English learners globally. The company is impacting both the personal and professional lives of its users, offering tailored and content-rich educational experiences that are changing the way the world learns English.

THE CHALLENGE

Evidence shows there is a correlation between the English skills and the economic performance of a population: English competence positively affects employment, income, and prosperity at the individual, regional, and national levels. World Economic Forum and Harvard Business Review research demonstrates that job seekers with exceptional English compared to their country’s average competency level earned 30% to 50% higher salaries.

However, inequities plague communities, particularly in less developed, economically distressed areas, and limit equal access to quality educational opportunities. Thus, despite large market demand, not all individuals have access to English training that meets their budgets, work schedules, and unique learning styles.

THE VOXY APPROACH

Voxy is a digital English language learning platform that works with learners of all proficiency levels to develop a full range of language understanding, including grammar, vocabulary, listening, reading, writing, and speaking competencies. Voxy’s rigorous and proven methodology allows learners to acquire skills and accomplish their goals more efficiently. Its advanced platform can be configured to meet the unique needs of each client– including educational institutions, language schools, and corporations – and their learners.

For employers, offering Voxy as an additional benefit can help attract and retain high-quality talent while also upskilling employees to unlock their potential. At the individual level, Voxy’s courses are adaptive using content and multimedia that are aligned with the personal lives and professional goals of its users. In other words, the manufacturing engineer who needs to give presentations in English will get a different experience than the university student studying for the TOEFL exam. Voxy’s tools help employees learn the right type of English for their specific jobs to drive both engagement and learning outcomes.

To ensure that users receive personalized feedback on speaking and writing, Voxy offers live online classes–both one-on-one and small group sessions–with every one of its courses. This model allows Voxy instructors to quickly comprehend the unique needs of each learner and subsequently design a curriculum with personalized instruction that progresses at an appropriate speed. The company’s personalized, career-aligned courses include a fully integrated mobile app, live instruction, and real-world content that is updated daily.

DEMONSTRATING RESULTS

In order to accurately measure efficacy, Voxy has established a set of research-based outcome metrics bucketed into four categories: Time-on-Task, Demonstrated Mastery of Language & Content, 360° Satisfaction, and Real-World Success. Additionally, to account for incremental improvements at the individual level, Voxy learners take regular proficiency and achievement tests as they progress through lessons. The Voxy Proficiency Assessment (VPA) benchmarks users’ understanding of reading, listening, speaking, vocabulary, and grammar, while End-of-Unit tests measure mastery of broader course content.

In 2018, Voxy published learner data that validates the efficacy of the company’s model and its impacts on its users. Using the VPA, the company measured learner improvement and found that:

• 98% of Beginner-level learners improved to a higher English level by using Voxy for 13 hours on average.
• 97% of High Beginner-level learners improved to a higher English level by using Voxy for 14 hours on average.
• 53% of Intermediate/Advanced level users improved within their level by using Voxy for an average of 17 hours, and 35% of Intermediate/Advanced level learners improved to a higher English competency level after using Voxy for an average of 27 hours.

To ensure that learners are mastering the content in their lessons, Voxy measures their performance on the End-of-Unit Achievement tests, finding that on average, learners pass those tests with a score of 80%. Further, live instruction proved to greatly impact student success: learners who spent 10+ hours in group sessions improved 30% more than average on the VPA, while learners who joined private, one-on-one tutoring sessions improved 50% more than average on the same proficiency assessment. Finally, Voxy users experienced real-world success in many ways, from acceptance into English speaking programs to receiving promotions at work. Voxy impacts its learners and the ways in which they can contribute to their communities by enabling collaboration, professionalism, business performance, and economic mobility through the acquisition of the English language.

 WORKING WITH HIGH-NEED LEARNERS

Stemming from a company desire to work with in-need but underserved populations, including immigrants and refugees, Voxy recently partnered with Jusoor, an international humanitarian NGO, to offer its services to Syrian refugees through a pilot program.

“After just three months of instruction, which included over 1,000 live lessons, nearly 80 percent of the refugee learners improved their proficiency level, moving from Elementary to Intermediate,” reported the company.

Given the pilot’s quick success and the resulting improved outcomes, Jusoor and Voxy have now entered an ongoing partnership. Further, Voxy has continued plans to engage and assist with the English language learning needs of additional underserved immigrant populations in the months and years to come.

Findings from the American Institutes for Research

Designed using decades of empirical research, Voxy’s platform is able to offer personalized instruction at scale that is adaptive to the needs and goals of learners.  Supporting Voxy’s evidence of their pedagogy’s positive effect on English language proficiency is a recent study from the American Institutes for Research. The AIR study was multifold with a focus on English language learners (ELL) in higher education. From there, researchers sought to understand whether access to Voxy’s platform during regular coursework in a community college language laboratory improved English language acquisition after one semester.

AIR researchers demonstrated that learners who used Voxy significantly improved their English language proficiency when compared with peers who were given access to traditional language lab software (in this case, Rosetta Stone’s Auralog TELL ME MORE). Further, learners accessed the Voxy platform outside of class time, spending nearly 75% of their time learning when they were not in class, suggesting that Voxy’s personalized language learning software keeps learners engaged and working outside of class time. AIR’s research confirms Voxy works better than traditional methods, drives out of class learning, and meets the unique needs of non-native speakers.