Hi, I’m a junior at a Vocational/Technical high school. I’ve been looking at colleges and most of them require a few years of foreign language. I took Spanish in middle school, but my school does not offer high school foreign languages at all as apart of its curriculum for all the time I’ve been at the school. I talked to my guidance counselor about this earlier in the year and they claimed that most colleges would disregard the language requirement since I’m from a tech school that does not offer the courses. I understand that there are ways to take Spanish outside of high school but I was particularly stressed with my current academics and extracurricular at the time, so I figured she was right at the time and didn’t want to do anything extra. However, I’ve barely found anyone thats had this problem, as every other school seems to offer foreign language. So is my guidance counselor right or should I be in a rush to focus on that more?
You may want to check college web sites about whether foreign language is required or recommended for frosh applicants.
What state are you a resident of?
Can you do FL at a local community college? Is for, and if you are thinking of applying to competitive colleges, it might be wise to do that. Having said that, colleges are supposed to assess you in the context of what your HS offers, so it might be overlooked.
In your shoes, IF I was aiming high, I would make an effort to do two years of FL at least.
It really depends upon the colleges that you are targeting. For most, other than the uberselective colleges, I suspect that there would be no issue if the HS and the state do not have foreign language requirements for graduation, particularly if the HS has sent kids to those colleges in the past.
Thanks, I’ve checked and a lot do state they require foreign language although some colleges really hide that information. Lots of colleges seem to “require” it, but its hard for me to judge as the other required courses are regular HS classes that everyone takes.
I’min Massachusetts and I plan on attending an in state/new England school
Thanks for replying, colleges judging based on what our school offers is what my counselor told me and what makes sense to me although taking CC classes would definitely not hurt at all.
I believe there is a community college that may offer these classes so I will figure out if I’m able to take Spanish I and II. If I were to apply to colleges while I’m completing these courses, would they deny me based on not having the credits yet?
“I’min Massachusetts and I plan on attending an in state/new England school”
I think that I would contact admissions at U.Mass Amherst and/or U.Mass Lowell or Boston (which ones might depend upon you overall GPA), and a few other schools, and ask them.
Try taking Spanish 1+2 at a CC
Ask your guidance counselor if students from your high school have been accepted for the major you are interested in at the specific colleges and universities on your list. Your counselor knows which places people have been accepted at.
IMHO.
For residential colleges - Bridgewater State Fitchburg State UMass Dartmouth Westfield State and Salem State would be totally available to you.
For commuter opportunities UMass Boston and Quincy College
UMass Lowell and the flagship Amherst campus will be very difficult imho.
The Amherst campus may not be a good option to try and catch up either if you haven’t been fully challenged academically. You have the capability as you are obviously very bright but the classmates will mostly be comprised of pretty high achieving and honors class college prep grads.
The other campuses may allow you to ramp up a bit instead of being thrown into a cauldron your freshman year.
One option to consider at the Amherst campus is the Stockbridge school. It focuses on agricultural sciences, agronomy, forestry and other applied sciences.
It may be an appealing path for a student with strong vocational interests and talents.
It combines the high end academics with a real technical skill set.
Just a thought. And it may be a way to get your foreign language requirements done on campus.
Check it out, I don’t know how it’s structured these days. it may be part of isenberg or one of the other colleges within the Uni. I haven’t been around for some time.