Hello, I’m a junior in high school and I took German 1 in eighth grade, German 2 in 9th, and German 3 in 10th. My high school requires that I take 2 years of a foreign language and since I’d taken German for 2 years in high school I wanted to try Spanish. Little did I know that nyu, Princeton, and a lot of other great colleges require at least 3 years of a foreign language, four being even better. Since I’m a junior in Spanish 1, I wonder if colleges will accept me taking the level after German 3 my senior year. Will it make up for my mistake, I have no problem doing that. And is the requirement 3-4 years of one foreign language or just a total of 3-4 foreign languages not necessarily the same? Thanks in advance:)
Many colleges of that caliber prefer 3-4 years of the same language. However, you taking German 4 your Senior year won’t matter to the colleges.
Edit: Won’t matter in the sense you’ll still have 3 years of one language.
Incorrect. In almost all cases, when the college says that they recommend 4 years of the same language, what they mean is 4 years in HS or completing level 4 in that language.
OP, if you take German 4 as a senior, you will have checked off the box for foreign language preparation.
Stick with German would benefit you more.
Sorry, what do you mean by OP and foreign language preparation? I just slightly misunderstood you.
OP = original poster, i.e. you.
Preparation means the number of years per subject studied in high school.
It usually means that if you complete the fourth high school level, you will have completed, for any college application, any requirement or recommendation of having “four years” of a single language. For college applications, “Four Years” equals for example: taking high school level 1 and 2 of a language in 7th and 8th grade, and level 3 and 4 in 9th and 10th grade; skipping the first two years of a language and taking level 3 and 4 in high school; skipping the first three years of language and completing an AP course in a language. In other words, the only thing you really need to show compliance with the requirement or recommendation of four years is taking either high school level 4 or an AP language course in high school. Also, there can be other college benfits to completing four years including at a number of colleges being able to skip a college foreign language requirement needed for graduation from college. Just be aware that if the foreign language you take also happens to be a language you already speak fluently, colleges that require SAT subject tests are not going to be overly impressed with high SAT scores in them. Also, if you are an international student from a country that does not have English as its language, the usual “foreign” language that you actually need is four years of English.