I am currently a sophomore and speak fluent Chinese. I have taken 2 years of Chinese, and have fulfilled my graduation requirement for my foreign language credit. I saw that Harvard “recommends” 4 years of a foreign language, and I was wondering how much of an emphasis they put on that. Would you suggest someone in my position to continue taking Chinese? I want to replace Chinese with an AP class next year and stack up on my math/sciences. Our Chinese class here is a joke (the teacher doesn’t even teach and we’re forced to watch videos every day). Should I just take an AP class instead?
Harvard (and all colleges really) have their own graduation requirements for foreign language. If you take the Chinese AP exam and score a 5, or score a 700+ on the Chinese SAT Subject test, Harvard considers you to be proficient in that language and, if admitted to the college, you will have fulfilled Harvard’s own graduation requirements for foreign language. Harvard “recommends” four years of a foreign language as most high school students take AP foreign language their senior year, so they need four years of a language to get to the point where they can take the AP foreign language exam. If you can achieve that earlier in your high school career, there’s no need to go beyond the AP level.
If you haven’t taken the AP Chinese class at your high school or haven’t take the AP Chinese exam and scored a 5, I would recommend you do so instead of stacking up on math/science classes.
I have a couple of thoughts.
Harvard, and other schools that have put thought into recommending a HS program, really don’t care what you want to do. They do not expect students to be specialists in HS.
If you “speak fluent Chinese,” why are you in a joke class? That’s not saying much for the rigor of your schedule. Perhaps if you took and aced the AP exam you would have some better ammunition. As it stands now, Harvard will reject ~95% of applicants, most of whom will have prepared themselves according to Harvard’s recommendations.