@websensation I, like you, hope my dd’s language abilities open the doors she is hoping they will. She is aiming for a C1, preferably a C2 level in her target languages. (The C1 in one is a decently realistic goal. For the other, it will depend on how much time abroad she does if she gets there before graduation. That might have to be more of a longer-term goal than UG. C2 is her dream goal.)
Both of mine learned Spanish on the fly working summers with migrant labor. #3 took 5 years of it in high school and #2 just picked it up out of necessity. #3 is a civil engineer so he has often been able to use his fluency on construction sites. My language was German and I took it all 4 years of high school and all 4 years of college. The only time it “helped” was in a prior job where we not only had a large presence in Germany, but ultimately I ended up reporting up to someone in Germany. That said, English is the language of business with sometimes the exception of older staff. Other than that I don’t use it much nor do I read anything anymore in German for fun. I’m quickly losing the skill.
My daughter was offered a summer internship in the US embassy in the country where she is a heritage speaker of the language. Obviously, knowing foreign languages helps with some government careers.
@lookingforward Some countries like Norway for example do a great job of teaching English from an early age. Pronunciation is good and little kids learn languages very very well. What you might forget is the pervasiveness of US culture via music, movies etc. Most people get their syntax there from an early age. Watching how people interact is the key. Mainly along the lines of, you can’t just learn it in a book or classroom and apply it. You have to see how it is used. That’s my issue with language instruction in the US, more of a focus on writing and learning words than learning all aspects of it. Ask anyone who speaks English as a non-native, I think most will tell you— they learned how to speak by watching (others, movies, TV etc).
I still watch the news in other languages. It’s great. You get the whole story from many perspectives. Love it. Just watching the gestures, dress and manners shows us how different and similar we are as humans.
Another example would be watching different native English speakers in a meeting. Take someone from the UK, New Zealand, India and the US. They will watch each other for cues. The words are the same but it’s not the same at all. Each person needs to learn the language of the other. Business isn’t just the words it’s the expectations and so much more. This is why people should learn a language to understand someone outside their own world view.
@Happytimes2001 Agree. But I’ve seen many internationals with excellent English skills.
I was responding to, “You will never get the same conversation from a German for example in business in English that you would if you spoke German.” I now see you meant both sides with the needed level of skills. Agree. Not solely in English. The nuances matter, including humor aand an understanding of different customs. The “more” you absorb.
Also agree that business has its own vocab/terminology (and syntax) that is not ordinarily taught in the high school or college classroom.
Language is fascinating and we had funny markers we thought confirmed increasing skill, in situ.
Long ago, being reasonably proficient in German got me a job with a German architectural firm. Originally they wanted to be a liaison with a project refurbishing American army bases. The job fell through, but luckily my German was good enough by then that they kept me. 
My son speaks Arabic well, he spent a semester in an immersion program in Jordan, and part of a summer and another semester in less intensive Arabic programs also in Jordan. He’s better at spoken Arabic than written Arabic. After graduating he worked for two foreign relations type NGOs. While I think they considered his experiences abroad a plus, it was really his familiarity with logistics and event planning that were most useful. As far as I know Arabic was not a consideration for his current position either.
I have known only one specific example when knowing a couple of languages helped. A graduate of a small and not well known law school sent out literally hundreds of resumes… and got responses (just three) from law firms interested by the mention on her resume that she knew Russian. In fact, her knowledge of Russian was, let’s say, fairly basic. But once she realized it was of interest to law firms she hit the books (and the internet) to get it to a much higher level. She ended up getting a job strictly because of Russian… she’s an attorney for an energy firm that does business with Russia.
In my experience knowing languages is helpful only in a small percentage of cases. We live in an English-centric world. In hiring, foreign languages come into play usually when the applicant also has sought after skills to go along with those languages.
@katliamom I had a visceral reaction to your post. Sorry. How would you know that it doesn’t help since I am assuming you don’t speak another language? I attended an international school and most of the people who went there spoke 3+ languages. Theyalso went into careers which decades later still involve some level of international skills everything from living in that country to jobs at the UN and world organizations. At the Ivy leagues I went to after the internet’s school, people who were multilingual often had connections with others who spoke the same language ( and often networked and socialized on that basis as well). Much money was made based on these connections.
People who don’t speak another language have often said to me that English is the international language. Wry smile here. While it’s true many speak English. Many more speak Chinese and many people also speak Spanish. I tend not to comment on things which I know nothing about, like physics. The reason is, I would have no context to comment. I find it odd that Americans think the world is going to speak to them in English and they will be at no disadvantage.
OP, I’d suggest you have your son/daughter speak to someone who speaks multiple languages ( or even only fluently) and has made use of this in their career. Everyone I know who speaks another language fluently has used it in their career. Some have used it a lot, some less. Taking a language in college for a couple of years isn’t the same thing as someone who attains a level of fluency (say by living a year in that country). It can be, but isn’t always. I’d be happy to connect your son/daughter with examples of people who have used a single language to distinguish themselves from many others. Like my brother in law who used French to get a job in international banking working for a French firm which he then parlayed into another specialization which led him to an amazing career as a Senior Exec at big firm. Or a friend who used German to start a company of medical devices, or myself who started a company manufacturing product in Italy and importing it. Or the lady the other day in the retail store who told me about her daughter who though and English major just got a job at Twitter checking out Japanese trends ( she speaks Japanese fluently).
There are many more avenues to use a language than being a language teacher. Even if you don’t know someone who speaks another language, maybe you can speak to someone who lives in the US but speaks others languages and was brought up in another place. Ask them about the process. I think your child will learn a lot.
One of the reasons language skills can be a plus is that people who are able to learn multiple languages can often pick up additional languages easily, making it easy for them to do business abroad or transfer to a new country where English is not always spoken. As an example, my husband speaks 3 languages fluently and took a fourth as a foreign language in school. He can be in a place with just about any Western language for a couple of weeks and pick up enough of the language to function decently by building on his existing language base.
Sue22 to Italian tour operator after member of Sue22’s company was injured and EMTs spoke almost no English: “Who do we have translating at the hospital?”
Tour operator: “Mr. Sue22”
Sue 22: “But that’s my husband. He doesn’t speak Italian”
Tour operator: “Yes he does. I’ve been talking with him. He speaks very good Italian.”
It turns out, after 10 days in Italy he did. The hospital didn’t bother bringing in their own translator for the non English speaking medical specialist.
Regardless of job prospects foreign language skills are valuable life skills.
Since my kid is starting to apply for internships for opportunities in SV and abroad, I will see if it helps. I am a big believer that it helps in standing out as long as your resume is similar to others in certain regions and markets, as long as you target your searches. Thanks everyone.
@blossom, Sorry if my post came out as an attempt to debate, which was not my intention at all. I thought you were talking about English speaking ability for non-English speaking business people. I have told my kid to emphasize his multiple language fluency ability in his resume for summer internship, so we will see. I think he’s looking for internships abroad or in SV.
@websensation, while fluency in multiple languages is certainly a plus, I think for a kid choosing between a language major/second major and a degree in something mainstream like economics, an Econ degree is more useful. Take it with a grain of salt from someone whose daughter is set on attaining full fluency at par with native speakers who attained a college degree in that language. So if she is lucky to get into your son’s school and chooses to go there (thankfully, she has a close more achievable contender for #1 choice), she’ll probably be majoring in Econ, and getting a masters in Globlal studies area of her choice as a co-term, and then taking classes in her language as she goes along, without any specific degree in mind.
20+ years ago, when I want to the same school with 4 years of scholarships/fin aid, I crammed B.A. in Econ, minor in IR and a masters for Engineering of Economic Systems as a co-term just because I could fit it in. I planned on going to law school, but then got married, started a non-profit that was essentially a full-time business working for a good cause, and law school was out of the picture. When opening a branch in another state and getting it licensed, I was able to use my “useless” EESOR degree to get licensed as an administrator. If I had focused in college on getting a formal degree to confirm my native language fluency instead of getting a co-term, I would have needed to hire someone to fulfill that requirement. Hope it helps!
I worked overseas for a Big 4 firm for over a decade and no one, other than translators, were ever hired due to their foreign language skills. That being said, many were helped to progress within their career due to their ability to speak other languages. I am sure other industries would be different.
My son speaks two languages fluently and is quite good at Spanish, at least he is able to communicate decently. He is a STEM person but likes languages too.
What would your child like to do with an economics degree? For some uses, having a strong mathematics background is important (or very important) and is more important than having foreign language abilities.
Right now, he thinks he wants to major in Economics and minor in Intl Relations, but not sure how that will turn out because he’s not that good in math. He’s in college to find out what interests him and what he is good at; he’s not really thinking about how to use what he likes to get a job — yet. He doesn’t want to major in languages but just take several classes until he’s done with highest level. He says the highest level class is not that high. Spanish is the only language he can improve somewhat at college.
I personally would like him to try to be an Ambassador to one of the countries whose language he speaks — ha, ha — but he says you can be the most capable person and never be appointed, and the State Dept job appointment is too political. My hope is he pursues public service rather than go for money, but I will support him in whatever legal he wants to do.
My feeling is that being proficient in a language may lead you to take opportunities you might not have otherwise. When my DH got an opportunity to do a postdoctoral fellowship in Germany, I was willing to go as well because I already knew the language. I would not have had anything like the same experience if I hadn’t been able to speak German. I was part of the German community not the ex-pat community.
I’ve spent the last two months in Hong Kong and I see the divide very clearly. There are people who have been here for years and haven’t bothered to learn a word of Chinese. They hang out at restaurants with European waiters and European food. Even though sadly, I don’t know Chinese either (one semester in 1984 does not count!), at least because we are attached to a university here, we are not hanging out with a bunch of westerners.
My former boyfriend majored in East Asian Studies and went on to law school then to working for an international loaw firm with offices in Hong Kong and Taiwan.
I know several recent grad college kids who have had overseas internships, Fullbright scholarships etc that were helped by their language abilities. Even though I was basically an art major taking a lot of architectural history courses I got a grant for senior thesis research from Harvard’s Center for European Studies because I actually knew the languages of the countries I wanted to visit. I was the first person in my major to ever get a grant.
When job hunting you don’t to have the language on the transcript to prove that you are competent.
State department is not a place I’d want to aim for right now. Maybe another administration will build it back up.
My D19 is heading to art and design school with an eye toward being a gallerist or curator, and she’s been taking Mandarin for many years (now with a private tutor on weekends, since her current school doesn’t offer it). Hopefully it will give her a leg up in dealing with Chinese art clients and artists, but it may not end up as a central selling point for her, depending on where she works. She has also taken French for the past two years, as we’re in a French-speaking country, but I expect she’ll drop it and forget most of it.
I speak a bit of French, but not nearly enough to help me in my career, in international financial journalism. We moved to Switzerland because of a new job for my wife, but my job isn’t dependent on local language skills. I’m part of a rotation that has to do occasional summaries of what’s in the local media, but I mainly use Google Translate, though I sometimes catch nuances that it misses. Languages are definitely helpful, and often crucial, for people who deal with the locals in reporting, though.
We’re moving back to the U.S. next summer after six years abroad (two here and four in Britain). I’ll probably keep doing Duolingo to stay fresh. I used it to wake up my high-school French and have also been doing German, not that I could have even a rudimentary conversation in the latter.
I work in the public sector, but the “final cut” for some of our positions have come down to people being fluent in languages. However, it’s more of a right place/right time thing and less about strategically trying to learn a specific language. For example, we just hired someone who spoke fluent French of all things because no one else on staff was extremely fluent in that particular language even though we have employees who speak fluent Mandarin, Japanese, German, Russian, Italian, Arabic, and, of course, Spanish.
Of note, there are two reasons why fluency is beneficial to us. The first is obvious - being able to speak the language. But the second is that people who are fluent in a language also know the protocols for the countries where the language is spoken. Knowing Mandarin is one thing - knowing the proper etiquette for conducting business during a tea ceremony is another level (and don’t get me started on the gift exchanges for Asian countries).
The points about needing to know the protocols/customs and business language usage are important. Not all school learning teaches that (not for the business context.) There are separate courses for technical/business functioning and haute etiquette. As far as I know, these are outside the college environment.
DH was vetted for his language skills, before his graduate U would recommend him for a research Fulbright. D1 was not, for her 3rd world F teaching assignment. Her friend assigned to teach English in Korea was not. But OP’s son’s abilities in Mandarin and Korean could help. Another friend, who had minored in Japanese got a job teaching English (through a private program) in Japan. His experience was enhanced by the interest and lang skills. An adult friend has been teaching in Asia, via a govt program.
These experiences can help on a resume. Not to the level blossom would vet for, the realities of the job demands. But for how they can represent the independence and independent functioning, abroad. OP has time to look into the various opps, work and internships. In fact, rather than the langs alone being any tip, it could be these first experiences interning abroad, a sort of platform to build on.
So, websensation, you might lso suggest he check all thee questions with the college career support office.
@Happytimes2001 What makes you think I don’t speak another language? Actually, I speak 3 fluently, and can read and understand 2 more. Did two study abroad stints. Lived in France for a year. Married to an academic specializing in – you guessed it – foreign language instruction and literatures with a broad background in international education and study abroad. Most of our friends are couples where at least one if not both partners are foreign-born/educated. Oh, and I spent the bulk of my career working in international media/real estate companies.