<p>Both our sons took Mandarin in their public middle school and high school (one of the few public schools to offer Mandarin, as far as I know, even here in the Bay Area). </p>
<p>The older son took Japanese this semester in college; next semester, he's taking Mandarin again (and spent a summer in Beijing taking Mandarin during HS). The younger son dropped foreign languages this year (his junior year) to concentrate on all his AP and honors classes, knowing he needs his GPA to be stronger this year.</p>
<p>Our older son loves the Asian culture, so we're not surprised he's continuing his Mandarin studies in college, although his Mandarin grades hurt his GPA in HS. We felt it would help him professionally if he stays on the West Coast and ends up in business, as appears the case, even though both sons were the only Caucasians in their Mandarin classes in middle and high school.</p>
<p>Chinese program details are supposed to be available in January 2007. It was not available in the first year of this initiative but planned for the second year.</p>
<p>NY Mom--Re learning chinese. I have a twelve year old that started this year. I found a teacher from Craig's list who is starting her own Chinese school (on Saturdays) She is developing her own curriculum, but the one book she liked is called Learn Chinese with Me, by People's Education Press.It comes with two CD's. I think there are four levels total, but I have only the first two. We found it on an ebay store, and is developed for mid-high school students to start learning Chinese. It's a nice level, and everyone seems to like the book. If your child is interested, go for it!</p>
<p>College Chinese courses are not something you can casually "take a few of just to learn the basics". The college classes are very intense and time-consuming, so you would have to decide to make a major commitment if you plan to add it to your schedule.</p>
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College Chinese courses are not something you can casually "take a few of just to learn the basics".
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<p>I have to agree with this. Mandarin study at most top universities is considered one of the hardest course sequences one can take. For example, at S's school a 3.0 qualifies one for the honors paper in East Asian Languages & Civilizations.</p>
<p>My daughter is in her fourth semester of Mandarin at a rigorous college. She started as an absolutely beginner. It is very time consuming, but she loves it and has done very well so far. Unlike many of her fellow students (and her parents and her sibling), math and science are not her strength. I keep reminding her that many of the people who find the chemistry and engineering classes (that are so intimidating to her) to be easy would likely find studying Mandarin to be absolutely impossible . So I guess the "hardest course equence" can vary from person to person!</p>
<p>I take Mandarin in high school! My Chinese class even went to China last spring to visit our sister school and use our language! I chose to take it because it's different, the most people in the world today speak it, and i had already had about 6 years of spanish in middle school and elementary school. I like that I had another option to learn a different, and fascinating language. It's kind of hard though, the tones and characters take a lot of practice and memorization. Yay for Chinese III!</p>
<p>This reminds me of when everyone was rushing out to learn Japanese. By the time they got decent at it Japan was so over. Some think China will also have a crash in the near future.</p>
<p>"Oh no! Boom in Arabic and Chinese?! Nooooooo.
Don't take my competitive edge!!!"</p>
<p>See, now this is why you should take Russian! One of the few new Critical Languages suffering from under-enrollment. plus, we russki students throw the best parties. ;-)</p>
<p>End of shameless plug for my language of choice. :-D</p>