<p>Yes, Latin counts. It is equally if not more "impressive" as modern languages. S passed out of the foreign language test by scoring over 600 on the Harvard Latin exam (equivalent to SAT-II).</p>
<p>Marite is pretty knowledgeable about Harvard in general. She is an excellent source of information. She is right on the money of H having flexible requirements from high school and that includes even not having four years of language or even English. </p>
<p>In the last semester, student can also be exempted from enrolling in English and a foreign language provided a student has to take the courses which are high school graduation requirements. Our kid was in this situation.</p>
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H having flexible requirements from high school and that includes even not having four years of language or even English.
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<p>That is pretty standard, actually, not a special noble feature of Harvard. </p>
<p>Almost any private university will allow itself the freedom to make accomodations in special cases. The difference at the very top universities is that they have enough experience with extreme cases to know not to be overly dogmatic in presenting their "requirements".</p>
<p>I think people are missing the point of the initial post (although all answers are thought provoking) Here's a kid that wants to drop foreign language after ONLY TWO YEARS...I think from a common sense standpoint, that might be risky if he's looking at a top Ivy league education. There's even a BIG deifference between TWO and THREE years. Quite frankly, the vast majority of students have an area of strength. My Daughter, though brilliant in English, writing and History...stinks in math. I would never occur to me, (or for that matter the guidence counselor) to suggest that she stop taking math after two years because she wants an additional English class. There may be MORE of an argument after 3 years. Now that said, do ALL Harvard students have 4 years of Language? No...do 94%??? Even if it's 90%...you wanna be on that end of the stats? Now you take it down to 2 years? I think it's risky, and the compromise might be he should consider at least one more year. We actually had a discussion between a bunch of local parents over this topic. A mother was asked if her kid "NEEDED to keep taking French" the counselor said technically it's not required to graduate, but almost all schools will be expecting at least three...and this kid is dyslexic. (She does have a history of As and B's in it)...she's hoping for Ohio State!</p>
<p>I did advise the OP to beware of the level of difficulty of French III. It may not be good enough.</p>
<p>It's the four years of a foreign language, especially if one's tongue is not English, that I was arguing against. Classes and teachers vary enormously. S took Spanish IV (having started in elementary school) and Latin III. He did better on the language placement test in Latin than in Spanish, though his school grades were comparable in the two languages.</p>
<p>The Harvard foreign language placement is fairly generous for most language, and the exams are perfunctory. They are not a scientific calibration of fluency and the process seems to err on the side of placing student in a more challenging course rather than demanding full equivalency with Harvard's version of the prerequisites.</p>
<p>i got into harvard with 3 semesters' worth of spanish and 2 semesters' worth of japanese under my belt. i'm fluent in neither and i neither took a single AP foreign lang test nor a foreign language sat ii. i say, as long as you can make up for it in other areas, it's not THAT big a deal.</p>
<p>I agree with siserune about the placement tests not being particularly rigorous, which is why I think that the recommended four years of a foreign language are just that: recommended. Harvard is quite willing to disregard this recommendation if a student can show strength and passion in a different area.</p>
<p>I have a random question, and I don't mean to highjack this thread, so it'd be great if someone could just briefly answer me.</p>
<p>By the end of high school, I'll have taken four years of English and French (beyond French IV because my school is completely French), and at least 2, and possibly 3, years of Spanish. Also, my family is Croatian, so I am fluent in the language although I have never taken a class. How is fluency-without-the-class looked upon?</p>
<p>Being polyglot is definitely a plus. You don't have to provide proof of fluency. List the languages you are able to read, write and speak. For example,
Croatian (native)
French (language of instruction)
English (4 years)
Spanish (3 years).</p>
<p>Claims of language proficiency on resumes acquire much more credibility if the (often different) degrees of reading, writing and spoken fluency are specified for each language. I assume this is true in some measure for college applications, as there are many immigrants' children applying who have some kitchen familiarity with their ancestral language but possibly very limited vocabulary or reading/writing ability, having done their schooling in English.</p>
<p>Marite: Thanks for your help. In my last post, I didn't make it clear that English is the language that I'm most fluent in. It's my native language along with Croatian.</p>
<p>Firstly, I thank everyone who took the time to reply to my original post your comments have been very helpful.</p>
<p>Secondly, I wanted to see if the comments would change if I gave my rather different scenario. The only reason I considered dropping French this year was because it was a regular class (versus) all my other honors classes, had it been honors there wouldn't be a problem as I would be on track to take the AP French Lang. I just moved to the US this past year and for whatever reason my french skills were lacking and so making honors French doesn't seem likely, would it still be worth taking another year of regular french which might just seem like me trying to go to college or would it be better that I follow my passion and do independent research instead?</p>
<p>hey this is what i am doing. French 2-freshman French 3 Soph French 4- senior year. I am skipping French in junior year (This coming year) becasue my schedule is hard, and i am seriously almost dysleix in languages. Will i be okay, i do show stregnth in other fields math and science. Does someone recomend taking a summer course (i live near a community college) and then getting it put on my transcript so then it would be like taking 5 years. I am also hesitant about taking french 5 becasue in my school of 3000, the class has only 4 kids and is extremly hard. I am not just asking for harvard, but also colleges like cornell, MIT any other top universities.</p>