51Talk Announces Strategic Partnership with Highlights and Teacher Created Materials

BEIJING, Aug. 28, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- 51Talk (or "China Online Education Group"), a leading online education platform in China (NYSE: COE), this week announced that it has signed a global strategic partnership agreement with leading educational publisher Highlights and Teacher Created Materials (TCM).

Highlights (also referred to as Highlights for Children), is an internationally recognized American children's magazine. Since it began publication in 1946, Highlights has sold over one billion copies worldwide. Through this partnership, 51Talk will introduce more than one thousand English language picture books from Highlights, and further contribute to the improvement of its K-12 English language learner product line.

The "Read with Highlights" book series which 51Talk recently introduced has several key focuses. The first is on providing leveled reading materials that scale according to each student's language ability. These materials are categorized into four levels: novice, basic, advanced, and superior. Secondly, this series focuses on utilizing a wide range of story topics in order to further develop students' logical capabilities and abilities to think globally. The last focus is on great storytelling, which research has shown to improve students' language proficiency.

On the topic of the partnership, Michael Davis, Director of Business Development at Highlights, announced at the ceremony, "The purpose of our partnership with 51Talk is to provide a flexible, diverse, and effective English learning experience for Chinese students."

51Talk's partnership with TCM, a leading publisher in the education sector, will also further this purpose. TCM will give 51Talk the rights to over 400 books in mathematics, science, social studies, and many other fields.

These materials will be incorporated into the fabric of 51Talk's Academic R&D department, as well as appearing throughout its online library. Such an addition will provide its students with access to a highly diversified set of English learning resources.

Martin Dean, Vice President of TCM, stated that "We believe that through our cooperation with 51Talk, the strengths of its teachers will be amplified which will result in exciting contributions to this flourishing sector in China."

The partnership with Highlights and TCM is a strategic move that will further allow 51Talk to combine high quality educational resources with a large scale online platform. In 2016, 51Talk entered into a partnership with American International School Utah (AISU), to collaborate in areas such as academic research, curriculum development, lesson product development, and teacher recruitment and training. Going forward, 51Talk aims to bridge its global educational resources with its students to better equip them to speak with the world.

As Jack Huang, the CEO of 51Talk explained, "The partnership with these two internationally recognized publishing houses furthers our platform's core strategy. We believe that through introducing these publications to our students, we will make a strong impact on their learning progress."

About China Online Education Group

China Online Education Group (NYSE: COE) is a leading online education platform in China, with core expertise in English education. The Company's mission is to make quality education accessible and affordable. The Company's online and mobile education platforms enable students across China to take live one-on-one interactive English lessons with overseas foreign teachers, on demand. The Company connects its students with a large pool of highly qualified foreign teachers that it assembled using a shared economy approach, and employs student and teacher feedback and data analytics to deliver a personalized learning experience to its students.

SOURCE 51Talk