Voiance’s Parent Company CyraCom Recognized as a Top 50 Privately Held Company in Arizona

CyraCom was recognized as one of the top 50 privately held companies in Arizona by the Phoenix Business Journal as part of the Arizona Corporate Excellence (ACE) Awards.
The ACE Awards were created to recognize the largest private companies in Arizona for their investment in the state. These companies are very important to the economy of Arizona and to the families of their employees; they generate revenues of over $15 billion per year and employ over 40,000 employees in the State of Arizona and over 56,000 worldwide.

CyraCom employs nearly 1,000 people in Arizona, with most of these jobs having been created in the last three years and the company was recognized as the second fastest private job creator in Arizona in 2012, by Inc. magazine’s Hire Power rankings. CyraCom is one of the largest language service providers in North America and has been able to develop this important sector of the economy by drawing from Arizona’s linguistic diversity. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has indicated that language services, particularly interpretation, are growth areas for careers and business for the next ten years.

About CyraCom International, Inc.
CyraCom is the largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation (OPI) operating solely in the US. OPI is a three-way call between an interpreter, an English-speaking representative, and a non-English speaking customer. In addition to OPI, CyraCom offers Document Translation, Video Remote Interpretation, On-Site Interpretation, and Interpreter Assessment and Training services. CyraCom has four locations in Arizona and is headquartered and founded in Tucson. In 2013, CyraCom received a Stevie Award (American Business Award) for Company of the Year in Business Services. CyraCom provides over 200 languages and has more than 3,000 clients, including some of the largest healthcare, insurance, and financial services companies in the US.

Languages and the Need for Speed

Sometimes when using an interpreter, the speed and length of the interpretation may seem to vary wildly from what you said or heard.

For example, you say a sentence consisting of twenty syllables and your Vietnamese interpreter only uses a handful of syllables to respond: did the interpreter even say the same sentence? In another instance, your client seemed to jump from one word to the next very quickly, but when the interpreter provided the English version, the words were slow and simple.

Some languages seem so fast compared to English. Is there a difference between the speed of languages? Is your interpreter really acting professionally?

The answer is a resounding “yes!” to both questions. Some languages are spoken faster than others, say researchers from the Université de Lyon in France who published their study findings in the journal Language last year. The researchers recruited 59 volunteers who were native speakers of seven languages: English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Spanish and Vietnamese. Each participant read 20 different texts in their native languages into a recorder.

According to the Time Magazine article, the researchers found that some languages are spoken faster than others. They found Spanish and Japanese, often described as “fast languages,” clocked the greatest number of syllables per second. Spanish possessed a low-density syllable rate of .63, but sped along with a syllable-per-second velocity of 7.82. Japanese, which surpassed Spanish with its 7.84 velocity, had a minimal density of .49.

The “slowest” language in the set was Mandarin, followed closely by German. Mandarin, which topped the density list at .94, only had a velocity of 5.18 syllables per second. English was also on the lower end of the spectrum, with a high information density of .91 and an average rate of 6.19 syllables per second. Results showed that each text, no matter what language used, was told in relatively the same span of time despite sounding slower or faster.

So while you might believe you hear a discrepancy from an interpreter, your keen ears may simply notice the speed and density differences of the languages spoken.
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Voiance’s employee interpreters complete a 120-hour, in-class interpretation course – 80 hours longer than other interpretation companies – helping to ensure consistent quality and accuracy of interpretation amongst hundreds of interpreters.

Tips for Interacting with Non-English Speakers

Currently, one out of every eight Americans is foreign-born and 9% of the population is Limited English Proficient (LEP). Inevitably, you and your staff members will interact with Limited English speakers.

What kind of LEP training should your staff receive? The Diversity Council suggests the following for communicating effectively with LEP individuals, with or without a Phone Interpreter:

When speaking to an LEP person:

• Slow down a little, but not too much. Your natural inflection and intonation helps the listener understand your meaning.
• Do not raise your voice.
• Enunciate.

Chose your words carefully with LEP individuals:

• Use small, ordinary words. Avoid business jargon, cultural references (I need your John Hancock), slang, and idioms (We need to wrap this up).
• Omit extra words (Why don’t you try putting this there? Vs. Put this there.)
• Repeat what you are trying to say in different words.
• Avoid sarcasm or irony.

Avoid negative questions:

When you ask someone, “You don’t mind if I sit here, do you?” you expect the answer to be “No.” However, an LEP person will frequently answer “Yes,” meaning, “I agree with you; I don’t mind if you sit here.

When LEP people respond:

• Wait for an answer when you ask a question. It may take some time for an LEP individual to mentally compose a response.
• To check comprehension, ask the LEP person to repeat back to you or demonstrate what you have explained.

Act sensitively and respectfully to LEP individuals. The Golden Rule – treat others as you would like to be treated – remains the best tip for human interaction, regardless of native language or culture.

-Sarah

  

Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Our employee interpreters receive 120 hours of training, including language testing and instruction in listening and recall. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the largest provider of Phone Interpretation that operates solely in the United States.

Voiance Exhibits at APCO 2013

Voiance, a leading provider of 911 language interpretation services, recently showed support for the public safety industry by exhibiting at the Association of Public Safety Officials (APCO) national show in Anaheim, CA. More and more clients in 911 have been switching to Voiance because of the Arizona company’s high quality and service levels.

At the conference, Voiance educated public safety officials on the use of language services in emergencies, discussing new technologies and trends available to in the Phone Interpretation industry.

APCO is an international leader committed to providing complete public safety communications expertise, professional development, technical assistance, advocacy, and outreach to benefit its members and the public. APCO International celebrated its 79th Annual Conference & Expo for Emergency Response services and professionals.

About Voiance

Voiance Language Services is the new leader in language interpreter services in 911, Voiance supporting over 200 languages and operating 24/7/365.Voiance provides the shortest advertised connection times to interpreters. Unlike other providers that operate predominately from personal residences or overseas, Voiance’s dedicated 911 interpreters work in secure facilities exclusively in the US. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International. Visit www.voiance.com for more.

About APCO International

APCO International is the world’s largest organization of public safety communications professionals. It serves the needs of public safety communications practitioners worldwide – and the welfare of the general public as a whole – by providing complete expertise, professional development, technical assistance, advocacy and outreach.

Webinar with Steve Curtin: Delight Your Customers

In July, we sponsored the webinar, “Delight your Customers: 7 Simple Ways to Raise your Customer Service from Ordinary to Extraordinary,” with author and consultant, Steve Curtin, based on his book of the same title. Here are a few of our takeaways from the webinar:

7 Simple Ways to Create Extraordinary Customer Service:

Steve’s book outlines seven ways to create extraordinary customer service:

1. Express genuine interest
2. Offer sincere and specific compliments
3. Share unique knowledge
4. Convey authentic enthusiasm
5. Use appropriate humor
6. Provide pleasant surprises
7. Deliver service heroics 

These are all voluntary actions that an employee can choose to do which are all reflected in what Steve describes as Job Essence.

Job Function vs. Job Essence

Job Function and Job Essence comprise two halves of every employee’s job role.

Job Function describes the duties or tasks associated with a job. These are mandatory, process-focused tasks. 

Conversely, an employee’s highest priorities at work illustrate Job Essence. Job Essence responsibilities are relational and customer focused and not expected. Job Essence reflects an employees’ personality, uniqueness, and enthusiasm – coming at no additional cost to an employer. 

Encouraging a balance of both Job Function and Job Essence will lead to better employee performance.

Steve left us with a final quote to sum up customer service experiences:
“We do not remember days; we remember moments” – Cesare Pavese, Italian Poet.

-Sarah

Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Our employee interpreters receive 120 hours of training, including language testing and instruction in listening and recall. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the largest provider of Phone Interpretation that operates solely in the United States.

What Makes a Great Interpreter Part 2

In my last entry, we discussed how becoming an interpreter requires much more than simply fluency in a second language: as a highly specialized profession, it requires training and practice. We covered two skills that are requisite for a person to become a professional-level interpreter – language skills and listening and recall.

In this second part, we will cover three more skills that needed to be developed in order for someone to become professional interpreter that you can trust: Ethical behavior, cultural knowledge, and subject knowledge.

1. Ethical behavior: Regardless of their field of work, interpreters may encounter confidential or sensitive information. Interpreters working in medical and financial services must be particularly attuned to the strong regulatory environment surrounding patient and consumer privacy.

Ethical behavior extends beyond just keeping what you’ve heard to yourself. On the US Courts website, they list that an interpreter must be both impartial and “Able to accurately and idiomatically turn the message from the source language into the receptor language without any additions, omissions or other misleading factors that alter the intended meaning of the message from the speaker.”

2.  Cultural knowledge: It’s not enough for someone to be bilingual, it’s just as important to be bicultural. If a person is bicultural, they have naturally absorbed the sensibilities and nuances of two cultures and have inherent abilities to mediate between the two cultures that they belong to.

Dr. Holly Mikkelson from the Monterey Institute of International Studies states, “in all of their work, interpreters must bridge the cultural and conceptual gaps separating the participants in a meeting.”

3.  Subject knowledge: Imagine if you are tasked to listen to an academic lecture about aerospace engineering and then repeat what you had learned. Unless you are deeply familiar with how aerodynamics work, you might be hard-pressed to make any sense of the lecture, much less repeat it back in a way that is understandable to anyone else.

It is so critical that an interpreter understands the subject material of a conversation they need to interpret. If it is confusing to an interpreter due to lack of knowledge or she doesn’t understand the vocabulary, there is no way the audience of the interpreter will fare any better in understanding what is being said.

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Our employee interpreters receive 120 hours of training, including instruction in ethics and specific subjects in interpreting, including healthcare, insurance, and finance. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

What Makes a Great Interpreter Part 1

As a nation proudly made up of immigrants, the United States has numerous bilingual people. According to the US Census Bureau, there are nearly 31 million people in the United States who speak another language than English at home and also speak English very well – roughly 10% of the population.

Being bilingual is often seen as only the starting point for the training needed to become an interpreter. Interpreting is a highly specialized profession that requires training and practice. Professional-level interpreters acquire many skills that the average bilingual person does not possess or have not sufficiently honed.

In the article, “Interpreting is Interpreting – or is it?” by Associate Professor of Translation and Interpretation at the Monterey Institute of International Studies Dr. Holly Mikkelson states that “The fact that many individuals who are called upon to interpret in certain settings lack these [professional interpreter] qualities does not mean they are not needed; it simply means that the client requesting interpreting services does not appreciate their importance.”

So what skills are necessary for someone to be considered a quality interpreter? In order to give this topic sufficient coverage, we will break it into two separate blog posts. The first part will cover language skills and listening and recall:

1.     Language skills: This one may seem like a given, but what most people don’t realize is the extent of knowledge and vocabulary needed just for his or her native language. Michelle Hof, a professional conference interpreter and trainer who runs a blog called The Interpreter Diaries, writes, “As an interpreter, you need to be able to express yourself well in many different registers and have access to a broad active vocabulary covering different fields. Just growing up speaking a language does not automatically mean you will have these skills. I see it all the time in the early days of a course, when students can’t seem to stop themselves from talking like they do to their friends in the bar and start sounding like interpreters.”

And that’s just for the interpreter’s native language. On the International Association of Conference Interpreters’ website (AIIC), it says that in order to be an interpreter, his or her “understanding of the language should be comparable to that of an educated native speaker of the same language.”  

2.     Listening and recall: In the field of interpreting, there are two major interpreting methods: consecutive interpreting and simultaneous interpreting. Consecutive interpreting is the modality performed by Voiance’s interpreters, and it requires waiting until a speaker pauses before interpreting. In order to produce an accurate interpretation, this requires intense active listening, memory recall, and note-taking, since the speaker could talk for a few seconds to several minutes.

Interpreting requires more brain power than usual. Scientists have conducted experiments on bilingual subjects and found when a person transitions between two languages, the brain uses regions not traditionally used in normal language use. The use of those regions suggest that there is a need for greater coordination of mental operations and that phonological processing is more difficult when having to switch languages.

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Our employee interpreters receive 120 hours of training, including language testing and instruction in listening and recall. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Phone Interpretation in the United States.

Who Are Limited English Speakers? An Overview of Limited English Proficient People in the United States.

1.8 million immigrants come to the United States each year and of these immigrants, 51% are Limited English Proficient.

In this blog post, we combined the most relevant statistics from The American Community Survey (ACS) conducted every year by the US Census Bureau. This information can help you better understand your Limited English Proficient (LEP) customers. As LEP populations continue to grow around the United States, Fortune 500 and similar organizations increasingly rely on Phone Interpretation services to communicate with their non-English speaking customers.

The History of the LEP Population Boom

In 1980, 23.1 million people spoke a language other than English at home, compared to 55.4 million people in 2007. That is a 140% increase, during which the US population grew 34%. The largest numeric increase was 23.4 million for Spanish speakers.  Vietnamese speakers had the largest percentage increase at 511%.

The Four Major Language Groups

The US Census Bureau grouped all the respondents of the survey into four major language groups:

• Spanish
• Other Indo-European languages
• Asian and Pacific Island languages
• All other languages

The ACS found that 55.4 million people spoke a language other than English at home. Of the 55.4 million people who spoke a language other than English at home, 62% spoke Spanish, 19% spoke an Other Indo-European language, 15% spoke an Asian and Pacific Island language, and 4% spoke an Other language. We would expect the percentage of Asian and Pacific Island languages to increase, based on recent changes in immigration patterns.

Around 24.5 million people reported their English speaking ability as something below “very well” (or as Limited English Proficient, “LEP”). Higher percentages of LEPs were present for speakers of Spanish (47 percent) and Asian and Pacific Island languages (49 percent) than among Other Indo-European languages or Other languages groups.

What is the Largest Age Group of this LEP Population?

The younger the person is, the more likely they are to speak a language other than English at home. 24% of survey respondents age 5-17 speak languages other than English at home compared to just 17% of the population ages 41-64.

Where is this LEP Population Located in the US?

Languages spoken at home are not evenly distributed throughout the nation; just 2% of West Virginians 5 years old and over reported speaking a language other than English at home, while 43% of people in California reported the same.

The graph on the right shows the concentration of the LEP population for each state. There are many large states that require language assistance for your customers in order to be successful.

-Sarah

Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

Language Proficiency: How much is enough?

One of my interpreter friends shared that she sometimes interprets for German speakers who are nearly fluent in English, but requests an interpreter when they deal with their insurance company.  Why?  ‘What they are doing is using their German to double-check their understanding of highly complex insurance concepts in English.  They are also using the interpreter’s understanding of the terms to make sense of them.’  She further explained, ‘This means I really have to maintain both my German and English at the highest level to communicate those concepts.’

Language proficiency is at the heart of interpretation. Whether what is said is highly technical or more casual; in a formal or less formal setting, the ability of the interpreter to listen and comprehend and speak and be understood is key.  Users of interpretation services rightfully ask their language service providers to explain how they determine an interpreters’ language proficiency before they hire them.

Two sets of guidelines are widely used in public and private sectors to define levels of language proficiency:

• ILR (Interagency Language Roundtable) scale
• ACTFL (American Council of Teachers of Foreign Languages) scale[1]

CyraCom’s language assessment tools align with these scales and the company only hires interpreters whose working languages are at a minimum ILR Speaking Level 3 or ACTFL Superior level.

These guidelines define what speakers can do in the language and this is important because the very complex task of interpretation requires that interpreters use their languages in many different ways. The ability to use language as described in the Level 3/Superior Level guidelines are a minimum requirement to even potentially perform accurate and complete interpretation in most settings. Below is my distillation of these (lengthy and technical) Level 3/Superior Level descriptions:

Who fits this level?

Individuals who are able to comprehend and speak the language and use it to meet a range of professional needs.

Where can speakers use the language?

Speakers can communicate in both formal and informal conversations discussing both concrete and abstract topics.

What are speakers able to do with the language?

Speakers can effectively explain complex matters in detail, discuss social and professional topics, support an argument and make hypotheses, and perform professional duties and tasks. Cultural references and nuances in meaning of some words may pose challenges, but speakers at this level can easily overcome them.

What does the speaker sound like?

Speakers use the language with ease, fluency and accuracy. They may make sporadic errors in formal speech, but these errors do not interfere with native speakers’ understanding. Speakers at this level may have a noticeable foreign accent.

Reaching this level of language proficiency in two (or three) languages is an enormous achievement and it is just the start to becoming an interpreter.  Fortunately for us, as interpreters, constantly developing our languages is a challenge that we meet happily.

-Mitchel

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

Get to know “People Not Like You.”

In February, we sponsored the webinar, “Crafting the Customer Experience for People Not Like You,” with multicultural marketing expert Kelly McDonald, based on her book of the same title. In this webinar, Kelly McDonald dug in to discuss the difficult topic of how to service diverse groups. Here are a few of our takeaways from the webinar:

Don’t limit your definition of diversity

Often times, people generalize diversity down to racial and ethnic differences. A truly comprehensive definition looks beyond ethnicity to include:

• Gender
• Religion
• Political views
• Age/Generation
• Sexual orientation
• Rural/Metro
• Military/Civilian

Basically, “people not like you,” can include anyone who differs from you in any aspect. Factors like life stages, core values, or whether they are foreign or US-born can influence the way your customers respond to messages and services.

Understand how customer segments differ

Kelly covered key values and insights of several different customer segments. Here is a breakdown of a few of her examples we felt had interesting differentiators:

Understanding and catering to different segments based on their values will increase market share, customer loyalty, and set you apart from your competition. What steps will you take to show your customers that you really “get” them?

To read more about Kelly McDonald’s approach to a multicultural market or to purchase her book, visit her website here.

-Gina

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

There is More to Bullying: Essential Elements of a Bullying Glossary

If you work in the educational setting, whether as an interpreter, an educator, or an administrator, you need be thinking about expanding reference material on the subject of bullying. Here are some tips to get started.

• Learn about bullying, as there is more to it than you might think. I was surprised to learn that bullying is a relationship issue and that not only the victims but also the bullies suffer from depression later in life because of involvement in childhood bullying. 
• While there might be good materials about bullying at your school, http://www.stopbullying.gov/ has useful resources for building the glossary.
•  Be aware of culturally bound terms and concepts, and properly identify and explain them in your glossary. For example, the term ‘depression’ is commonly used in relation to bullying. However, it might not have a direct equivalent in other languages or might be misunderstood in relation to children in other cultures.

When you begin building the glossary, it is best to organize the terms under separate categories for quick reference. Here are some essential elements of a bullying glossary:

Treat your glossary as a living, breathing document. Review and update it as new information becomes available or on a regular basis.  

1. The definition of bullying
2. Types of bullying
3. Characteristics of students who bully and who are bullied
4. Types of bullying behaviors
5. Causes of bullying
6. Consequences of bullying
7. School intervention initiatives and solutions
8. School policies and rules about bullying
9. Tips for parents to respond and prevent bullying

As bullying leads to serious health and mental health issues, and the terms in these areas are often challenging across language and culture (such as ‘depression’ in my example above), it is important to give special attention to them in your glossary.

An effective communication between parents and teachers is critical in efforts to create a safer and more respectful environment for all children. Building a useful glossary can help support that effort.

-Mitchel

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

US Hispanics: The Social Media Leaders

The US Hispanic population is more active on social media than the average US internet user. A Pew Research study showed that 72% of Hispanics claimed to be active social media users. The US Hispanic population makes up 66% of the total US Limited English Proficient (L.E.P.) Population.

What is it about the Hispanic population that drives them to Social Media?

A combination of a young demographic and a large amount of mobile and home internet usage drive the population toward Social Media.

The US Hispanic Population is Young and Growing

According to the US Census Bureau, the Hispanic population in the US grew by 43% between 2000 and 2010. Over 60% of the Hispanic population in the US is under age 35. Young adults are more likely than any other age group to use Social Media. In a recent study, 83% of adults age 18-29 use social media. The median age of this population is in the key demographic of social media users.

Hispanics outpace all ethnic groups in mobile data and internet consumption

Hispanics are 28% more likely to own a smart phone and have an average mobile device bill 8% higher than any other ethnicity. Over the past year, Hispanics have also increased their home broadband use by 14%, which is more than double the growth of broadband use in the general market. On an average day, 26.8% of Hispanic internet users spent 6 hours or more on social media. The large use of mobile and home internet allows for greater access to social media sites.

 

Which Social Media Platforms are Favored by the Hispanic Population?

A survey from BIGinsight showed that Facebook and Twitter were the two most popular social media sites among the Hispanic population. This survey showed that 43% logged on to Facebook and 17% logged on the Twitter more than once a day.

As marketers work to reach this rapidly growing Hispanic population, social media platforms should be a clear focus of marketing efforts. Hispanic adults are 25% more likely to follow a brand on social media and 21% more likely to repost links, articles, videos, and websites compared to the general online community.

The US Hispanic population makes up 66% of the total US Limited English Proficient (L.E.P.) Population. Being able to communicate to them in their language would be a large benefit to any of the business sectors.

When was the last time you posted, tweeted, or pinned for your business? The Hispanic population is waiting to see what you have to say and show!

-Sarah

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

LEPs Moving to the Suburbs

Each year, a rising number of Limited English Proficient immigrants relocate to the suburbs. Are suburban schools ready for them and their children?

The NY Times noted that since 2000, in areas where immigrants traditionally have not settled, immigrant population grew by more than 60%. In contrast, the foreign-born population level in urban areas remained the same for the first time in several decades.

The majority of immigrants are Limited English Proficient (LEP). Children of immigrants comprise 90% of LEP students.

Enrollment of LEP students in suburban schools is growing. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, LEP students made up 8% of public school enrollment in the suburbs in 2009-2010, closing in on the 14% of LEPs accounted for in urban areas.

What does this mean for LEP students? LEP students lack resources and infrastructure in suburban communities where diversity is new, but growing. In a study by Applied Linguistics, of 115 newcomer programs (English transition programs for recent immigrants), urban areas comprised 76% and the suburbs represented only 17%.

Challenges for LEP Children

LEP children face several challenges in the education setting. A report by NCSL presents some of the challenges:

• Twice as likely as English speakers to drop out of school
• Expected to perform the same level on state standardized tests as  native speakers
• Supply of English language classes does not meet demand
• Schools with low-LEP populations offer “fewer remedial programs, less parental outreach and support, and less native-language instruction.”
• Fewer racially and ethnically diverse staff present schools with low numbers of LEPs

The Urban Institute urges training of non-ESL/bilingual teachers even for schools with small/moderate LEP populations. They remark that “training on LEP education would not only help their LEP students, who otherwise run the risk of being overlooked, but would also help teachers prepare for the likely possibility that in the near future, the LEP population at their schools will grow and become a reporting category.”

Responding with Limited Resources

However, suburban areas responding to a rapidly increasing LEP community find their fiscal and human resources limited. Minnesota, where immigration is high, is a prime example. English learner programs are nothing new to Minneapolis and St. Paul where diverse communities have flocked to for years. However, unprepared Mounds View Public Schools in the suburbs of Arden Hills, New Brighton, Shoreview and Vadnais Heights had to start hiring diverse staff and rely on community partnerships due to large immigrant growth. The district saw nearly a 100% increase in LEP enrollment just in the past six years.

Even though schools are trying to respond to the increase in LEP students, some are finding it increasingly difficult to cater services to a variety of languages. Many schools turn to services such as on-site or over-the-phone interpretation to communicate with the parents of LEP students. As more and more immigrants call the suburbs their home, language resources will be essential for not only the success of LEP students, but also for the success of American schools.

-Gina

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

Seven Sectors that will Benefit Most from the Rapidly Growing US Hispanic Population

If the US Hispanic market were its own country, its buying power would make it one of the world’s top 20 economies. In fact, the US Hispanic market is projected to account for $1.5 trillion in purchasing power by 2015. The US Hispanic population makes up 66% of the total US Limited English Proficient (L.E.P.) Population.

It goes without saying that there are a number of business sectors that stand to benefit from this rapidly growing, diverse population, but which sectors will benefit the most from this dramatic demographic shift in the United States?

In a study by IBISWorld, the following seven industries identified as having the most to gain by the US Hispanic population growth:

1. Residential buying, food (grocery and restaurants)
2. Retail (especially clothing and electronics)
3. Education (higher education and technical schools)
4. Real Estate
5. Financial Services
6. Transportation
7. Entertainment and Media

Income Increase gives Hispanics more buying power

Not only is the Hispanic population growing, but their wealth is as well. From 2000-2011, Hispanic household income grew 31% in the $75-99.9K annual income bracket and 71% in the $100K+ bracket.  This increase allows companies to expand without having to look outside of the US for market growth.

Negative percentages in the graph represent a decrease in population of those income brackets during the 11 year span from 2000-2011.

By 2015, Hispanic buying power is projected to be $1.5 trillion compared to $1 trillion in 2010. Increased wealth means bigger purchases. This increase will directly affect the automotive industry where by 2016, Hispanics will contribute roughly $14 billion. A recent automotive market survey showed the top five car brands among Hispanics between the ages of 18 and 34 are:  Mitsubishi, Nissan, Toyota, Suzuki, and Honda. This is in large part due to their major marketing efforts within the Hispanic community.

This example from the automotive industry shows the growth potential for the businesses in the seven sectors that target their marketing and advertising efforts towards the growing affluent US Hispanic population. These businesses will see steady growth for many years to come.

The US Hispanic population makes up 66% of the total US Limited English Proficient (L.E.P.) Population. Being able to communicate to them in their language would be a large benefit to any of the business sectors.

-Sarah

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Voiance Language Services provides multilingual support in over 200 languages to business and government. Organizations use Voiance’s telephone interpretation to facilitate communication with customers. Voiance is a subsidiary of CyraCom International, Inc., the 2nd largest provider of Over-the-Phone Interpretation in the United States.

A Different Country: The US in 2050

America is becoming more diverse. This past May, the Census Bureau revealed that “for the first time, whites represented a minority –49.6 percent– of all U.S. births” (1). Many minorities are immigrants with Limited English Proficiency, and roughly 9% of the US population is Limited English Proficient.

By 2050, America’s racial composition will undergo a major demographic shift. Combined, minority populations will grow from 116 million to reach 241 million in 2060. According to a report by Pew Research, the US population in 2050 will comprise of:

• Non-Hispanic whites, 47%    
• Hispanics, 29%
• Black, 13%
• Asians, 9%

This demographic shift to a “majority-minority” population will occur even sooner for the American youth. Whites will become a minority group in the under-18 age group by 2018.

The Diversity Effect

Changing demographics increasingly affect politics. In the most recent election, minority votes accounted for 28% of the total votes cast. Over the next four elections, 46% of newly eligible voters will be minorities compared to today’s 29%.

Politicians are not the only ones recognizing demographic change. In November, Reuters explained the trend of catered shopping malls in response to the growing minority population. In Atlanta, developers transformed a 220K sq. ft store into a mall catered to customers with roots in southern India. The article stresses reaction to diversity stating, “If mall and shopping center owners fail to adapt to the changing demographic make-up of the country, they risk seeing their properties become mausoleums of a less-diverse American past.”

The US will be a completely different country in the future. What will your America look like in 2050?

-Gina

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