Hello, i am currently a sophomore in high school. As of now, even though it is only the beginning of the school year, I feel I am struggling in Spanish 3. I was debating whether to take and continue Spanish and take AP Spanish next year, but I feel like I would do bad. Previously, my grades have been very high, but ever since this year, I have been unable to get the same great grades as last year. I also am very interested in taking Chinese which currently, my school does not offer so I plan on taking it in college. So the problem is, I want to go to Stony Brook for college and major in computer science but I feel like it would look better if I continued to AP Spanish all the way despite not doing so well in the previous Spanish class, however if I don’t take Spanish, I know for a fact I will take Chinese in my college years and that will cover my graduation requirements. I do plan on taking rigorous AP classes junior and senior year such as APUSH(if I do take AP Spanish, I probably won’t take this one and vice versa), AP Physics, Calc BC, etc. Should I take AP Spanish, I’m not particularly interested in Spanish as much as Chinese because I really enjoy Chinese culture and my parents are encouraging to take it instead of Spanish. On top of that, I have a very time consuming job to help support family as well. I know that Stony Brook isn’t super selective but I’m feeling very conflicted as to what to pick. I’m afraid my transcript will not look as strong because I’m also in limited extracurricular activities (although I do plan to join National Honor Society as well) because of work. Sorry for the super long post and any advice at all will be extremely appreciated. Thank you!
It is my understanding that most schools want to see four years of a foreign language. So if you have already done two years of Spanish you should continue. You don’t have to do AP Spanish if you think it will be too much with all the other AP’s you are taking. You can take Spanish IV honors.
Three years is sufficient at a vast majority of colleges in the US.
Stony Brook is very hard to get into but for a STEM major having Spanish through level 3 will be considered enough. You will need a very strong background in calculus and all three from bio, chem, physics + at least one of these, preferably 2, at the AP level. Finally, try to work in your programmation skills and if you’re eligible for College now, try to take Discrete Math.
Thank you very much for the advice. I will plan to take Spanish IV, hopefully it’s not as bad as AP Spanish and I will be able to pull myself through. And of course I will focus on more science and math courses. Now is it worth taking APUSH? I know that class requires a lot of commitment and effort and I’m not exactly sure if it’s worth juggling that class along with my other classes since history isn’t really a major major thing computer science I’m pretty sure.
Always worth it to take the full range of cores. When you have a college in mind, pays to look directly at what they ask for, in terms of hs courses. https://www.stonybrook.edu/undergraduate-admissions/future-students/
Sometimes, a strong appliant for stem can get away with less foreign lang. Usually, wwhen there’s an obvious schedule conflict. But you want to prepare as best you can, for your apps.
Colleges like kids who cover the educational bases. You aren’t talking about a purely technical institute.
It is still much closer to the start of the school year. Can you talk to your Spanish teacher to see if there is anything that may help you do better and/or feel more confident. I don’t know about your high school but here we don’t pick next year’s classes until April so no need to make a decision for a while.