Has anyone had their high school student get foreign language waivers? How did the college admission process go? I have called several colleges and most say they would consider the applicant even without the FL if student has language waivers from the high school. But student’s high school concerned that in the end, colleges will deny due to lack of 2 years of a foreign language- even schools that claim to have no FL requirement such as tech schools. What is your experience?
Thanks for sharing! (would replace FL with history)
Universities’ foreign language REQUIREMENTS are not capriciously established; they exist for sound and long-proven reasons. Were an institution to grant an exception to this prerequisite, wouldn’t it be similarly compelled to waive requirements for mathematics, English, history, laboratory sciences, and so forth? Maybe we should simply allow each teenager to establish his own criteria to demonstrate academic and intellectual readiness for undergraduate studies?!?! Good grief!!
I should have mentioned the student has a documented learning disability. But I do see your point.
This is a great question you post. My D has dyslexia, undocumented and after a lot of hard work on our part outside of school, she excels at a bunch of stuff - AP classes (as many as she could take), band, math, writing, reading, etc. While foreign language study certainly has its merits, not every student, especially those with phonemic awareness issues, should be required to prove they can do college level study by becoming fluent in a language. I don’t get that so many public universities require this as part of admissions, while many of the liberal arts schools do not. I am researching schools that have a more holistic approach to students and will re-post when I find those gems.
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I abandoned this thread after the rude response by Top Tier.
But after noticing owl1700’s post I realized that maybe this thread would be helpful to others in the future.
I will give you some follow-up on our experience. My daughter who is entering 11th grade favors math and science as that is where she excels. Dyslexia make studying foreign language frustrating and difficult to master. I do not feel that is the best use of her energy given her lack of phonemic awareness and her struggles overcoming the challenges of learning English!
I researched and found about 20 schools (safeties, matches and reaches) that would take a qualified applicant either without any FL or with official waivers from her high school plus documented learning issues in this area. The head of her private school and the guidance counselor were very concerned that having no FL would limit her in the college selection process. They did agree that she could take sign language for 2 semesters at a community college. She completed one semester this summer and really enjoyed it. Sign language uses completely different learning skills than a written language. She got an “A” too!
I will try to remember to update this post in the future as her college application process plays out.
By the way, dropping FL has freed her schedule up to take Honors physics junior year and potentially AP physics in senior year if all goes well. Those are 2 courses that aren’t for everyone just as FL might not work for everyone 
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@naviance, I know a couple of students with various challenges who have had great success with sign language as a foreign language option- thanks for putting it out there for others.