Daughter is a rising junior, currently doing an internship in the engineering dept. of our state university. Her mentor (a European professor) has been advising her to start learning Chinese right away. It’s not offered in her high school and she will be taking Latin 3 and Spanish 4 when school starts as well as studying French outside school (started 1+ year ago, at Intermediate-level; she finds it enjoyable and stress free). She will be taking 7 academic courses junior year because she is doubling up in language and science. She loves languages and has not gotten a grade below an A in any course yet so she can probably handle the academic load. The question is: How important is it to know Chinese if she decides to pursue engineering (she is still undecided but will likely be math/science major)? What is the best way to study Chinese outside of school? Are online courses an option as that would provide more flexibility? What is the name of the course that she should take: Pinyin, Traditional Chinese? Thank you for any advice.
Does anyone know if it’s important or beneficial to know Chinese if you want to be an engineer, as this professor believes?
Unless she is planning on studying or working in China, I would say a knowledge of Chinese is not needed.
@TomSrOfBoston Thank you for your feedback. It would not be easy for her to learn Chinese and we had no idea if this particular professor’s pressing her to learn it was good advice or not. At this point in her life, she would be more interested in studying/working in or near a U.S. city (NYC, Boston, Philadelphia) and studying abroad in a European city. (We live in the Southwest.) If anyone knows why he is so adamant about her studying Chinese, I would be interested in knowing the reason.
If she is focused on engineering, then she should take several STEM-related courses. However, learning languages makes it appear to colleges that she is a well-rounded student. This may be the reason for the professor’s persistence, or it could be just because he has a high opinion of his class and thinks students should take it.
@jj4547 Thanks for your comment. She is already studying three languages and I don’t think this has anything to do with admissions. The professor (of engineering) who is recommending that she study Chinese is at a university where she is doing an unpaid internship. She is undecided about a college major but loves math/science. What STEM-related courses are you referring to? Her school only offers standard/advanced calculus I, II, physics I, II, chem, etc., so anything else she would have to learn outside school. She did learn and build things with Arduino during the internship. Is there something else or programming that she should know? She is a late bloomer to mathematics.
2 years of high school Chinese would do diddly squat for her. It is slow going and difficult for non heritage speakers. Progress isn't like French or Spanish.
This is one of the more interesting questions that I have seen here. I do not think that now is the time for your daughter to start Chinese, especially given the trouble it would entail. Later, though, if she works in certain industries (electronics?), I think it could be a very helpful skill to have. She would likely have a number of Chinese speaking colleagues and Chinese speaking customers and collaborators.
The best way to learn Chinese after getting a bit of a start is to actually spend time in a Chinese speaking country. Given how young your daughter is, I think her time is probably better spent developing her interest in/foundation for engineering. If she’d like to augment those skills with a helpful foreign language, she may be able to take some time abroad in college to do that.
@gardenstategal @Sybylla Thank you. It sounds like there is a consensus here that Chinese isn’t needed right now. If she wants to explore it for fun, that could be an option, but sounds like she doesn’t need it to be an academic priority. Maybe she can ask him why, though typically she doesn’t like doing that, and she knows how busy he is.
I am an Engineer and the professor is probably just thinking more globally than we tend to do here in the US…she won’t need Chinese to be an Engineer.
@cafe9999 "If anyone knows why he is so adamant about her studying Chinese, I would be interested in knowing the reason. "
The only thing I can think of is
This professor might have research projects sponsored or funded by Chinese companies,
When I visited Leipzig University, I realized a lot of German students there were studying Chinese as well, I believe it is a good to have language while China dominates manufacture industries. Especially, for engineers.
You might be able to find CSL (Chinese as a second language) classes near your town. Usually, those Chinese schools are run during weekends (it will not conflict with your daughter regular school schedule.)