<p>Hi,</p>
<p>I'm trying to construct my freshman year schedule and have hit a roadblock. Which will medical schools value more: a full sequence of Chinese language (through which I would gain proficiency), or a double major with economics.</p>
<p>neither. do what you think will help you in life. med schools wont care about any of that stuff</p>
<p>If you want to study a foreign language, Spanish would be of more utility than Chinese. (Esp if you live, want to to attend med school and eventually practice medicine anywhere in the Rocky Mtn West/Southwest, including California)</p>
<p>But trapezius is correct–med schools really don’t care.</p>
<p>Great, thank you for your help everybody!</p>
<p>Some med schools specifically say that Spanish is preferred. But its not mandatory.</p>
<p>what State are you a native of?</p>
<p>Spanish is always highly valued, but it might depend on your location. Where I am Spanish or an East Asian language are highly favored. Do what you would enjoy more, but fluency in a language is always useful, regardless of whether you go to med school or not.</p>
<p>There are plenty of Chinese Medical students with the fluent Chinese (are you one of them?). I do not see any value in taking Chinese in UG. On the other hand, Spanish is great and might open great opportunities. I do not agree that it depends on location. I believe that even at locations with relatively low Spanish population, Spanish is very valuable. The key is “relatively low”, as it is pretty high practically everywhere. However, the opportunities at Med. School might to do with the experiences abroad. D. had used her Spanish and another foreign language to gain both experiences and very positive comments from her superiors while at Med. School.
However, she did not mention her 3 Foreign languages in her application at all aside from her UG transcript and she took only one semester of Spanish.</p>
<p>I know that my son’s Spanish fluency played a role; it was mentioned in every interview.</p>
<p>D. continue stating that she is NOT fluent and continue impress herself afterwards with how much she can actually use it. It kind of become a strange cycle. With every opportunity, she would attach desclaimer and would mention afterwards that she had a great experience and was glad to be chosen.<br>
It seems that Spanish is a winner even if one is not exactly fluent (at least by her own assessment)</p>
<p>
Chinese would be useful if you want to be in IR. If you want to do a language as a pre-med, stick with Spanish. Impending demographical changes will make it invaluable.</p>
<p>why would chinese be useful in IR?</p>
<p>With all the money we owe to China, the next generation might be writing checks to them for a long time and they might demand that the checks be written in Mandarin 
</p>
<p>International Relations major explores the relationships among countries, governments, peoples, and organizations around the world. With China being the emerging second “super” power both economically and militarily, language skills in Mandarin make a lot of sense for the IR major.</p>
<p>o I thought you meant interventional radiology</p>
<p>This article mentions that the lack of Spanish language skills cost one hospital $71 million in a malpractice payout:
[MMS:</a> Error](<a href=“http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp058316]MMS:”>http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp058316)</p>
<p>So, learning Spanish definitely doesn’t seem like a bad idea.</p>