<p>My son, a HS junior ('13) is a pretty bright kid who suffered from many emotional issues resulting from PTSD caused by bullying in middle school. Eventually he was given a 504 classification and has been doing much better since qualifying for the extra attention. His GPA is up to about 2.9 and should continue to improve in his senior year.</p>
<p>However, I am concerned about the fact that even the less selective schools list 2 years of the same foreign language as a requirement for admission. He has never successfully completed even a single year of a foreign language. He got a "D" in Italian and had to drop Spanish twice.</p>
<p>Is his lack of foreign language classes in HS an absolute bar to admission at anything but a CC?</p>
<p>This whole process is very stressful for him. I'm an Ivy grad and his brother went to Vandy, so he's really feeling inadequate even though we try to encourage and support him.</p>
<p>I don’t have an answer for you, but I am guessing that your kid can’t be alone . . . there must be other students who’ve been unable to master a foreign language.</p>
<p>My suggestion would be to look at every small school you’ve never heard of to find the ones that have more flexible admissions requirements. Perhaps I’m mistaken, but I’m guessing there have to be some out there!</p>
<p>Also, do a search of the parents’ and/or college search forums for threads focusing on colleges for students with learning disabilities. Again, just a guess, but schools that are willing to work with students with LD’s should also be willing to work with students who’ve had other issues that interfered with completion of stated requirements. One school that I’ve seen mentioned is Landmark College in Vermont. The focus is students with LDs, so it might well not be the right fit for your son for the long term, but they might be able to accommodate your son for a year or two to get him up to speed in the subjects he’s having difficulty with.</p>
<p>And someone more knowledgeable than I might be able to come up with far better suggestions than these!</p>
<p>What about a private tutor for foreign language? I myself was a private tutor for a girl wo was failing French I for the second time (after failing Spanish I in her first year). As a junior, in French I, she absolutely had to pass that and go on and pass French II to graduate from the private school where she was enrolled. I was hired for $10/hour to teach her French. She met with me, and took the tests that the real class took. I was able to engage her in a different way than the regular teacher, and I got her through French I and most of French II with only the one year of tutoring. I am not sure where you live, but it is worth a shot.</p>
<p>One other thing, I forgot to mention. Go to [url=<a href=“http://www.ctcl.org/]www.ctcl.org[/url”>http://www.ctcl.org/]www.ctcl.org[/url</a>] (Colleges That Change Lives) for a very good list of colleges that you may not have heard of, that offer wonderful programs. Not all colleges do require foreign language, so keep looking!</p>
<p>Most of the colleges in my state that your S would be competitive for with his GPA “require” 2 years foreign language for admission, but if you actually ask them they’ll tell you that isn’t a firm requirement-- though they’ll most likely require it once he gets to college depending on his program, so you will want to find out what’s going wrong for him and how you can help. But do do some asking around and see if it will really be a firm requirement just for admission. That may take some of the pressure off while you guys figure out what he needs to do to be able to pass the classes in college.</p>
<p>Alice Lloyd College - KY
College of the Atlantic - ME
College of St. Benedict/St. John’s University - MN
Curry College - MA
Keuka College - NY
Tusculum College - TN
University of Wyoming - WY</p>
<p>Foreign Language recommended, but not required:
Alma College - MI
Blackburn College - IL
Warren Wilson - NC</p>
<p>And there are many others!</p>
<p>Of the schools listed, College of the Atlantic is perhaps the best known and is an amazing school, especially for students with an interest in marine biology. And don’t dismiss Univ. of Wyoming as “just another state school” - Wyoming currently holds the #1 spot in the U.S. for per capita state spending on higher education!</p>
<p>I would also second the recommendation to look at the [url=<a href=“http://www.ctcl.org/][b]CTCL[/b][/url”>http://www.ctcl.org/]CTCL[/url</a>] schools, as well as the schools listed in Donald Asher’s book, “Cool Colleges.”</p>
<p>Do you have any idea why he has so much difficulty with languages? It sounds like his 504 is not LD-related…</p>
<p>I second the idea of a tutor. This summer he could work with either an incoming AP student or a class of 2012 grad from his school. I would plan on continuing tutoring into the school year, and see how it goes. You could get a recommendation from your HS language department. Sometimes kids find working with a near-peer more motivating and less intimidating. And, of course, the going rate for HS students is a lot lower. If you look on craigslist, you will find ads for language tutors, many of whom are native speakers. You’ll have to gauge how well they would get on with your kid.</p>
<p>You would have to pick a language, of course. Since he actually passed one year of Italian, that might be your best choice.</p>
<p>I would advocate addressing the language thing now for several reasons: firstly, getting a comparatively decent passing grade in a second year of Italian would give him the basic two years; secondly, I bet it would do wonders for his confidence; and lastly it would put him in a much better position to deal with college language requirements.</p>
<p>I would call the schools he’s interested in and ask them. At the private schools my D applied to the HS course list was recommended, not required. </p>
<p>FWIW, My nephew, who had a foreign language track record like your son’s had a lot of success with ASL.</p>
<p>If he is dyslexic he may be able to get a waiver, although Italian may be a great choice, I read that fewer native speakers of Italian are dyslexic.</p>
<p>Also check the graduation requirements for language at the colleges. They may have two years for admission but require a third course to graduate, if three years haven’t been taken in highschool.</p>
<p>Another option may be the community college and then transfer to a state university route, depending on whether the state universities have foreign language transfer or graduation requirements.</p>
<p>For example, in California, all of the state universities require a minimum of second level of high school non-English language, or equivalent proficiency demonstrated by testing or attendance in a non-US school primarily teaching in a non-English language, for freshman applicants. However, not all of them require non-English language for graduation (or may require for some majors or divisions but not others), so a community college student who transfers to a campus and major without a non-English language requirement may be able to complete a bachelor’s degree without non-English language courses in high school or college.</p>
<p>You may want to check if this is an option in your state.</p>
<p>Not sure what his intended major is, but many colleges require proficiency (usually defined as the equivalent of 4 semesters of college level foreign language) to graduate with some degrees (especially Bachelor of Arts degrees). Maybe some colleges will allow some flexibility in what is considered a foreign language, though (eg, sign language? I also personally think proficiency in a computer language should count as well! But am not sure any colleges would agree…). But that is something for him to watch for.</p>
<p>Another thing to watch for-- I tried to go this route and didn’t do my research thoroughly enough. I transferred from CC to Umich and tried to get my language out of the way at the CC where I would get better support. Umich accepts foreign language credits per their articulation agreement, so I thought I had everything taken care of, however even if you’ve completed the requirement and have credit for the courses, you still have to take the placement test and pass to X number of semesters worth of proficiency or you will have to take the courses over again at the university and lose the credits you already took which is a HUGE waste of time and money. Umich’s placement tests really played to my weaknesses and the result was not amusing in the slightest. If I had to do it over, I wouldn’t have taken the foreign language at the CC unless it was required for admission to the university. Not worth it.</p>
<p>I would, however, have probably taken foreign language in high school and tried to build as much foundation as I could.-- I never attempted one before college. That would have paved the way for later. I struggled a lot.</p>
<p>If you have a local CC or college, then he could try dual-enrollment there for a language class his senior year. In general, you can usually count 1 college semester as 2 high school semesters, so 2 semesters of language at CC should be the equivalent of 2 years of high school language.</p>
<p>Perhaps it’s more important to figure out whether or not he will be emotionally/psychologically ready to handle living away from you rather than worrying about the foreign language requirement. If he’s still struggling emotionally, you may want to seriously consider keeping him under your supervision for the first two years of college. Let him test the waters by attending your local community college. It’ll give him the chance to complete his general ed requirements (including the foreign language) and it’ll buy you some more time to see if he can emotionally handle the adjustment to a new academic environment.</p>
<p>I don’t know where you are located and what kind of school your S is looking for. In my midwestern state, our public institutions automatically admit students with certain test scores/GPAs or class ranking. For out-of-state residents, it’s more based on test scores. There is no foreign language requirement for admission. Our state has an “Honors” designation for high school students that requires the completion of specific courses (eg 4 years of math, 2 years of foreign language, etc.) but none of our state public universities require high school foreign language for admission.</p>
<p>Some of the public universities DO require a foreign language as part of the degree requirements once admitted, however. It depends on the degree.</p>
<p>So, there are available options for admission to a four-year university other than community college.</p>
<p>Thank you all for you input and advice. This is extremely helpful and gives me a lot to work on for him.</p>
<p>His mom and I do think he’s going to be ready to head off to college, but we’re not 100% sure, and we will evaluate that issue in the fall. All the other points are well-taken, and CC remains an option, as there are a couple of pretty decent CC’s not too far from his mom’s home in NJ.</p>
<p>He, however, very much wants to go to a traditional college and appears to be working very hard towards that goal. I will make some phone calls about the language requirement.</p>
<p>Our local school district offers American Sign Language, and it meets the foreign language requirement for high school graduation. I don’t know which, if any, colleges would accept ASL but it is another avenue to explore.</p>
<p>I was allowed to make up the foriegn language requirement at my school by taking two semesters worth of any of the ones offered (so i chose Japanese).</p>