These product certifications provide rigorous, credible signals for education organizations, school administrators, instructors, and families looking to acquire technology that was designed specifically to meet the actual and diverse needs of learners.
SoapBox Labs, a voice technology company, is the first to be certified for Prioritizing Racial Equity in AI Design Products. The voice technology developed by SoapBox Labs is specifically designed for children’s unique speech patterns, and it powers some of the most widely used digital learning solutions for literacy and language instruction and assessment across all grades PreK-12.
SoapBox Labs achieved the certification by presenting documentation demonstrating that they are:
To commit to developing an equitable tool, they must be intentional and transparent in their technology design; critical, collaborative, and reflective in iterative improvements to their technology; and accountable for delivering technology that establishes equitable and powerful learning experiences and outcomes that recognize and address learner variability.
“This award not only recognizes SoapBox Labs’ commitment to racial equity, but it also signals a huge step forward for the edtech sector,” said Nidhi Hebbar, co-founder of the Edtech Equity Project.
Madison Jacobs and I are overjoyed to see SoapBox Labs develop best-in-class voice-enabled technology that sets a high industry standard by investing in the critical work required to guarantee that AI works well for learners of color.”
This Product Certification supports racial equity by proactively detecting and mitigating racial bias in product algorithms and design, as well as requiring goods to be honest about the design processes and efforts they take to identify and mitigate racial bias.
This is the first in a series of awards given to edtech products that promote racial justice throughout their design and development.
