<p>okay i've taken spanish 1-3... is there anyway to be exempt from the required foreign language class? or is there a test i can take to get out of it?</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure everyone has to take a language at tulane at some point, regardless of whether or not you have AP credit or prior language experience.</p>
<p>I made a 5 on the AP Vergil Exam and have the choice of either taking one semester of Latin at Tulane or two semesters of a new language. I think I’ll be taking Italian at the 100 level next year.</p>
<p>You will take a placement exam before you come here, and that will put you in the proper level class you need to be in. The number of semesters of a language you have to take depends on your major, although I think it is usually 2 for science majors and 3+ for liberal arts majors, although I could be wrong.</p>
<p>This is just to confirm everything that tulane14 said-</p>
<p>Regardless of high school classes or AP credit, everyone must take (at least) one semester of foreign language at Tulane.</p>
<p>SO - If you get credit for an AP score, you can either take one more semester in that language (with the level determined by the Language Placement questionnaire sent out during the summer), or you can start over and take a new language (2 or 3 semesters depending on your college).</p>
<p>Notice that I called it a Language Placement questionnaire, not an exam - for Latin (my language of choice as well, go us tulane14!!), I simply had to tell them about my previous Latin classes and AP scores as applicable - no actual Latin knowledge required.</p>
<p>NOTE: No clue how this applies to transfer students.</p>
<p>classicgreen: When precisely is that Langauge placement questionnaire sent out (by whichever dept. by Tulane)?</p>
<p>couldn’t i just purposefully fail the test so i get put in the basic language class? and i’m in business so how many classes of it do you think i’ll have to take?</p>
<p>Izzy4college: I know it was during the summer, but I can’t remember if it was before or right after AP scores came out.</p>
<p>Chaymck: As far as I know, that’s fair game. My understanding of the language placement thing is that it’s for YOU- you’re the one ultimately scheduling your classes. I know of a lot of people who were mistakenly placed in a level that they weren’t ready for, and they moved down after the first class.
Because it’s not a knowledge-based test, there’s no need to fail anything on purpose. If you really want to take an introductory class, I don’t think anyone would argue if you claimed that the one you were placed in felt too advanced. Does that make sense? Let me know if you need a clarification!!</p>
<p>You could probably get away with it, although Tulane should be looking at your transcript as well, so they shouldn’t let you take the intro Spanish course if you have had 3-4 years with good grades.</p>
<p>There is no test. It’s based off of a questionnaire where you say how many years of language instruction you’ve had, your grades, and a few questions about how confident you are with your knowledge and how you’d rate your prior instruction. If you say you’re not confident in the language, and you haven’t done it rigorously, then you probably can take the intro anyway.</p>
<p>just another opinion, but i was in the same boat as you and had taken 4 years of spanish in high school and was placed in the 3rd semester spanish class. i wasn’t sure how strong my spanish skills were, plus i wanted an easy class, so i decided to go down to intro. big mistake…i went to one class which was so easy it was incredibly boring that i went back up to 3rd semester, where i was originally placed. the class, while more challenging, was still relatively easy and i got an A.</p>
<p>and it’s only one class for one semester…not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.</p>
<p>^^^ Yea, well it’s a big deal as a parent who is paying $50K a year and each class comes out to costing $5K (10 courses per year). I’m ticked off that a language is required. I can’t think of any other school where you can’t place out of it.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t worry about paying for a language course you student doesn’t care about as Tulane allows students up to 19 credits per semester. Also after their first semester they can request an override if they have a good GPA and take up to 25 credits. My D took 19 her first semester and 22 -23 per semester since then, It can be a lot of work but no problem getting you money"s worth. Many schools charge over 18.</p>
<p>My D would have preferred not to take a language either but that is another matter.</p>
<p>Yeesh, no one wants a true liberal arts education any more! LOL, kidding, although that was the idea behind reinstating the foreign language requirement some time back. I guess if one finds it really offensive, then don’t pick Tulane. I really don’t mean that in a snarky way, although I know it sounds like it. I just mean that is what you get if you want Tulane. A semester or two isn’t that bad, and some students have said they ended up fascinated by the new language they tried. I remember reading one student’s story about how they took Arabic for the first time at Tulane because they had to take a language, and ended up completely changing their major and taking as much Arabic as possible.</p>
<p>Anyway, I was really going to comment on the credits issue mentioned by Septmbr. It was brought to my attention that Princeton Review had the cost of Tulane wrong (overstated, as if it wasn’t high enough already!) and so I called them and gave them the correct info. In the course of the conversation I mentioned that at Tulane you can take up to 25 hours without additional charges, and the guy was really surprised. Apparently that is fairly unusual. After he confirmed all that with Tulane, they fixed their site. I have to give the man credit, he called me back a couple of times to let me know his progress and that it had been fixed.</p>
<p>It might help to take a language not usually taught in high schools, such as Arabic. Probably will be easier and slower paced. I remember taking French 101 in college and from the first day the prof spoke nothing but French. Good thing I had 4 years of French in high school so I could keep up. That 101 class was notably less populated a month into the course.</p>
<p>LOL, wow. That is extreme. Sounds like a prof that knew how to lighten their work load!</p>
<p>I should add that I think you are right about the languages not usually taught in high school. One of my D’s majors is China studies, so of course she started in Mandarin her first semester at Tulane. They did not offer this in her high school. She has done great and learned so much I am always astounded.</p>
<p>I took 4 years of HS French and loved the two semesters of French I took in college. It was a much more fun course than HS, and really helped me a great deal with my language skills. My son had 4 years of HS French and was put into an intermediate course at Tulane. He realized after the first two classes that he was in way over his head, and dropped down a level, where he was much more comfortable. Looking back, he says he should have gone with his first instinct, which was to study Arabic (a much more marketable language skill these days!).</p>
<p>i agree moonmaid! i think the foreign language requirement in the end actually benefits most students. in this day and age, with how interconnected and global everything is, it seems that having a few semesters worth of a foreign language would in the end be quite useful. of course it sucks to take a class you may not be interested in, but (using a simple example) i sure as hell was never interested in math but now am ever so glad that i know how to add, subtract, and calculate a percentage.</p>