<p>Colleges don’t look at middle school grades. If for some reason or another, colleges will see that particular grade, you might want to mention that. Otherwise, colleges are oblivious to your (hardly a) fluke. That means there’s no reason to flip about the actual grade.</p>
<p>Instead, think about what that grade represents. Is that B the result of a bad year, bad test-taking skills, etc., or do you just not understand? Maybe French isn’t your thing. That’s fine. In that case, repeat the class next year. French is like math; don’t keep taking the harder courses unless you have a good foundation. You were granted a tiny boost by taking it this year, an opportunity to jump ahead of your peers. If that’s not the path that you’ll be the most successful on, don’t take it! Colleges won’t look down on you for choosing the wisest path for you, especially if your area of interest is outside foreign language. You’re lucky you had the chance to take this course in middle school to get a taste of it. Colleges will be blind to that boost, and they certainly won’t penalize you for it. It’s not part of your GPA, rank, etc, so chill!</p>
<p>Actually, as post #17 suggests, this may not be a silly question at all. At some schools, certain middle school grades (especially if they are accelerated) are included on the high school transcript, and are used to calculate high school GPA. Tip: if you want to ask a question like this, leave out any mention of Ivy League schools, and ask whether high school GPA is important enough to retake the middle school class that counts toward GPA. In your case, I would have to say no. This will have only a minimal effect on your overall GPA, and the hassle of taking the same course again is probably not worth it.</p>
<p>the issue for OP is not 8th grade… OP states that his/her high school allows certain courses for HS credit, and this is one, and will appear on the high school transcript.</p>
<p>My advice to OP is to reevaluate the fixation on Ivy League. I attended a HYPSM school, my wife an Ivy League school, and both of us other schools as well.</p>
<p>Getting in, or not, to an Ivy League school will have zero (I don’t mean minimal, I mean ZERO) bearing on your future success in business or life. Having high goals is certainly laudable… but learn more about the relationship between college selectivity and life success and you’ll immediately relax about the Ivy thing, relax about grades, and ACTUALLY LEARN BECAUSE YOU WANT TO.</p>
<p>It really depends on your reasoning for getting those B’s… did you just not study for the tests? I know I took Spanish I freshman year and was not prepared for the amount of time I would have to study to get As… I got straight Bs all year. But in Spanish 2 and 3 I just buckled down and really studied and I have gotten A’s easily in the class ever since.</p>
<p>If you are prepared to really put time into studying, I would say go ahead and take French 2. If you think you will study about the same, take French 1 again and master it.</p>
<p>This is a very reasonable question and people should not be giving you a hard time.</p>
<p>If you are trying to get into a highly selective college and your high school offers five good years of French and you think you have an knack for French and can do well in more advanced classes, DO NOT retake French 1.</p>
<p>Take French 2 9th grade, French 3 10th grade, AP French Language (or something like that) 11th grade, and AP French Lit (or something like that) 12th grade. And get mostly A’s in these courses. That B in French 1 will not hurt you. Five years of a language is an advantage for selective college admissions; it will definitely cancel out any disadvantage of that 8th grade B.</p>
<p>(Something similar:
in my niece’s school district in Minnesota, the highest level 8th grade math class counts as a high school class and appears on the HS transcript even though the course is taken over at the middle school.)</p>
<p>just drop french 1, in my school you only need 3 of a language to graduate so people typically drop 8th grade classes to raise their GPA since my school has wieghted classes(5.0 for AP)</p>
<p>you getting into college is not the biggest problem in the world you know. there are bigger things than that in life, and you need to start noticing it. do things you love, not what you think will look best on a FREAKING college application like 4235482578 other people.</p>
<p>I’d suggest not retaking it. If you had a B+ then you obviously know the basics to an average level. Brush up and work on it over the summer and take the next level freshman year.</p>
<p>Hey, guys, stop saying that 8th grade doesn’t count. For many students, it DOES count, because at least some of those grades are included in high school GPA, and GPA is very important. It’s true though, that the specific fact that you got a B in an 8th grade class won’t be important. Nevertheless, it makes perfect sense to think about maximizing GPA, as soon as your grades start counting.</p>
<p>And yet, here on College Confidential, you’ll read many tales of woe of people whose GPA’s are lower because of their grades in early high school.</p>
<p>I don’t know if this is a ■■■■■, but my brother got one or two Bs and got into 2 ivy leagues.
Also, for those people saying ‘8th grade does not count!!!’ it kind of does in different places. All my friends who took languages and algebra in middle have those on their transcript. I have a friend who had pre-cal in the 9th grade and gets credit for geometry, algebra, alg II.
My French I teacher was kind of crap (although we took one year in two years if we started in middle school so I took it in 7th and 8th) but I did really good in French II.</p>
<p>Either you are a ■■■■■ or you are a child of really strict Asian parents who expects straight As from you. Don’t worry about French; just retake it in 9th grade. My friend got a B in French in 8th grade and took it again in 9th and went onto French 3. He got a B in French 3 but hey, he is going to Stanford.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, CC people are very sarcastic if you did not notice. XD</p>