<p>Anyone else here interested in taking Japanese at prep schools? I know that Andover, Exeter, and SPS offer Japanese. Any other schools?</p>
<p>I don’t think so, at least not at an advanced level.</p>
<p>I already speak Japanese at a native level, and out of the schools I looked at originally, only those 3 schools said they could do classes at a native level as well as a beginner level.</p>
<p>YES finanlly someone is bringing up Japanese, i love speaking japanese!!!</p>
<p>sanen mae, nihongo o benkyooshimasu, anata no?</p>
<p>@deerhotch,
I don’t speak Japanese yet. I take Japanese martial arts, and I’ve read a bit about Japan and I’m really interested in the culture. How hard is the language to learn?</p>
<p>Hi I’m a lawrenceville Junior and I’ve been taking Japanese since freshman year. But next year the Japanese Program will be discontinued. 
But I do know some friends in Taft, Andover, and Exeter who do take Japanese. I recommend that when taking Japanese make sure to do a summer abriad or even school year abroad program. By just going to Japan, I became mor efluent in the language.</p>
<p>It’ll be easier if you had an Asian background, preferably Chinese ;)</p>
<p>If you’re really interested in Japanese I’d suggest looking into Hawaii Prep. It’s not top tier, but it’s a pretty decent school, I’ve got a friend who goes there now (she applied there because of Japanese and of course that it’s in Hawaii) and loves it there :)</p>
<p>ifax- for an English speaker, Japanese & Arabic are some of the hardest languages to learn in the world. The sentence structure is backwards, and there are a ton of characters. but its definitely worth learning.</p>
<p>deerhotch -ima boodingu sukuru ni imasuka?
今ボーディングスクールにいますか？</p>
<p>haha typing in japanese just for kicks.</p>
<p>I really want to learn japanese too! but my mom keeps telling me its not a good idea since it’s not ‘useful’. she wants me to learn french or spanish… <em>sigh</em></p>
<p>but i think that there will be time to learn japanese when i’m in university. plus i already know chinese, so it should be a lot easier.</p>
<p>I’m currently studying Japanese.</p>
<p>Japan is the 3rd largest economy in the world (though it should very well be the 2nd). If you are entrepreneurial, then Japanese would be tremendously useful as well as Chinese.</p>
<p>this is coming from a Japanese citizen but…
Japan has a horrible immigration system, and a LOT of elderly people compared to young people [ie. 20 year olds were only 1% of the population this year.]</p>
<p>so looking into the future, Chinese would be a better bet, and a bit easier to learn.</p>
<p>However, Japan is an amazing place, and Japanese is an amazing, interesting language to learn.</p>
<p>@leppy8882,
Lol my dad said the exact same thing as you. He said it’d be more “useful” to learn Chinese, but Japanese language and culture is more interesting to me than Chinese.</p>
<p>Hey, I said Japan was the 3rd (should be 2nd) largest economy. China is still the first! I’m personally more inclined to learn Chinese. I’ve been to Beijing, Xian, and Shanghai. I loved Shanghai and all the energy!</p>
<p>Relative size of the leading country economies in terms of GDP/purchasing power parity:</p>
<ol>
<li>US ($15T)</li>
<li>China ($10T)</li>
<li>Japan ($4T)</li>
<li>India ($4T)</li>
</ol>
<p>I think we can all agree that the first on that list is a joke…, and I say this as an American-born US citizen! Our trade deficit is disgusting, and don’t even get me started on the debt!</p>
<p>Major reduction in economic growth are followed by reduction in the US trade deficit. </p>
<p>Trade balance is currently around -$500B, down from around -$750B in 2006.</p>
<p>Looking at Public debt as a % of GDP, the US has a far lower level than, say, Japan, Canada, France, Italy.</p>
<p>Looking at Public debt per person, the US has a far lower level than, say, Japan, France, Germany, Canada, Norway.</p>
<p>Yes, but Japan and China have a far greater capacity to produce than we do. I’m waiting for the day when they will realize that they can be their own consumers instead of supplementing our monstrosity of an economy. You seem quite well versed in the field. Are you familiar with Peter Schiff? I’m currently reading some of his works, and I appreciate that he isn’t drinking the Keynesian Kool-Aid if you catch my drift…</p>
<p>Nice choice of reading and avoidance of kool-aid. A good economic read for high school students and beyond is Economics in One Lesson (Hazlitt, 2007). You may have already read it.</p>