UVA and 4 years of foreign language

[Anonymous]

I have read this post and I disagree with OP's (and almost everyone's) interpretation.

She goes out of her way to say that the "goal is to show proficiency in a second language" and then adds that you might lose profiencieny if you don't take it all four years. But you may have already shown proficiency by taking up to level 4 as a sophomore.

This is what we know:
1. UVA wants proficiency in fl
2. UVA wants rigor
3. UVA assesses "holistically"

So back to the future stem major who posted this question a couple of months ago, it is very clear that the kid who reached Spanish 4 as a sophomore and then goes on to take Physics AP and CS APs instead will be fine - no PREFERABLE - to the kid who takes it all four years to reach level 4 .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have read this post and I disagree with OP's (and almost everyone's) interpretation.

She goes out of her way to say that the "goal is to show proficiency in a second language" and then adds that you might lose profiencieny if you don't take it all four years. But you may have already shown proficiency by taking up to level 4 as a sophomore.

This is what we know:
1. UVA wants proficiency in fl
2. UVA wants rigor
3. UVA assesses "holistically"

So back to the future stem major who posted this question a couple of months ago, it is very clear that the kid who reached Spanish 4 as a sophomore and then goes on to take Physics AP and CS APs instead will be fine - no PREFERABLE - to the kid who takes it all four years to reach level 4 .

Wow. Did you leave out the entire second paragraph of her answer on purpose??


So I don't have to take a language all four years of high school?

If the goal as a UVA student is to show proficiency in a second language, it behooves the student to keep taking language classes throughout high school. If you take time off from language work, you will most likely lose proficiency. You will probably have to do more work as a UVA student to meet the requirement.

Some high school students who say they're "done" with language work because they've met their high school's graduation requirement, but keep in mind that being competitive in a selective college admission process usually means going beyond graduation requirements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just wondering.

DD is a native speaker of Spanish but took 4 years of HS Spanish, including the AP class. Is this gonna be counted against her by the UVA?

It shouldn’t count against the kid but it should. Your kid took the easy route when others did not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read this post and I disagree with OP's (and almost everyone's) interpretation.

She goes out of her way to say that the "goal is to show proficiency in a second language" and then adds that you might lose profiencieny if you don't take it all four years. But you may have already shown proficiency by taking up to level 4 as a sophomore.

This is what we know:
1. UVA wants proficiency in fl
2. UVA wants rigor
3. UVA assesses "holistically"

So back to the future stem major who posted this question a couple of months ago, it is very clear that the kid who reached Spanish 4 as a sophomore and then goes on to take Physics AP and CS APs instead will be fine - no PREFERABLE - to the kid who takes it all four years to reach level 4 .

Wow. Did you leave out the entire second paragraph of her answer on purpose??


So I don't have to take a language all four years of high school?

If the goal as a UVA student is to show proficiency in a second language, it behooves the student to keep taking language classes throughout high school. If you take time off from language work, you will most likely lose proficiency. You will probably have to do more work as a UVA student to meet the requirement.

Some high school students who say they're "done" with language work because they've met their high school's graduation requirement, but keep in mind that being competitive in a selective college admission process usually means going beyond graduation requirements.

Just as I suspected. It is not, in fact, necessary, to take all 4 years of a FL to get into UVA.

Myth dispelled!

[Anonymous]

Whelp we are about to find out. DD stopped after junior year. Applied ED to UVA this year. Her scores are in sold admit range for our school’s scatterplot (no one with her scores has been denied in the last 5 years from our large VA public HS.)

She was aware of this when she elected not to take AP foreign language senior year. The teacher at our HS is particularly ineffective - she has very low pass rates and there tend to be about 7 kids total left in that language by senior year because she is so terrible. Took double science instead.

I will try to remember to update this thread when I know the result.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read this post and I disagree with OP's (and almost everyone's) interpretation.

She goes out of her way to say that the "goal is to show proficiency in a second language" and then adds that you might lose profiencieny if you don't take it all four years. But you may have already shown proficiency by taking up to level 4 as a sophomore.

This is what we know:
1. UVA wants proficiency in fl
2. UVA wants rigor
3. UVA assesses "holistically"

So back to the future stem major who posted this question a couple of months ago, it is very clear that the kid who reached Spanish 4 as a sophomore and then goes on to take Physics AP and CS APs instead will be fine - no PREFERABLE - to the kid who takes it all four years to reach level 4 .

Wow. Did you leave out the entire second paragraph of her answer on purpose??


So I don't have to take a language all four years of high school?

If the goal as a UVA student is to show proficiency in a second language, it behooves the student to keep taking language classes throughout high school. If you take time off from language work, you will most likely lose proficiency. You will probably have to do more work as a UVA student to meet the requirement.

Some high school students who say they're "done" with language work because they've met their high school's graduation requirement, but keep in mind that being competitive in a selective college admission process usually means going beyond graduation requirements.

Just as I suspected. It is not, in fact, necessary, to take all 4 years of a FL to get into UVA.

Myth dispelled!

You’re dispelled

[Anonymous]

While I have a highlight on my Instagram account about this, I thought I'd write a blog post about it, too.

The instagram about it is from 270 weeks ago. That's 2020.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whelp we are about to find out. DD stopped after junior year. Applied ED to UVA this year. Her scores are in sold admit range for our school’s scatterplot (no one with her scores has been denied in the last 5 years from our large VA public HS.)

She was aware of this when she elected not to take AP foreign language senior year. The teacher at our HS is particularly ineffective - she has very low pass rates and there tend to be about 7 kids total left in that language by senior year because she is so terrible. Took double science instead.

I will try to remember to update this thread when I know the result.

Her decision won't be just about that course, though. They have thousands of applications from awesome kids. If she doesn't get it, don't let her think it's because of AP French.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

While I have a highlight on my Instagram account about this, I thought I'd write a blog post about it, too.

The instagram about it is from 270 weeks ago. That's 2020.

What are you talking about? What instagram? No one mentioned instagram.

[Anonymous]

Let's see if this works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

While I have a highlight on my Instagram account about this, I thought I'd write a blog post about it, too.

The instagram about it is from 270 weeks ago. That's 2020.

What are you talking about? What instagram? No one mentioned instagram.

If you read the blog posts, she mentions that she has talked about this on instagram a lot and that there's a highlight about it.

Students and parents regularly ask about UVA's language requirements during my weekly, live q&a session on Instagram. While I have a highlight on my Instagram account about this, I thought I'd write a blog post about it, too.

The highlight has been there since 2020.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whelp we are about to find out. DD stopped after junior year. Applied ED to UVA this year. Her scores are in sold admit range for our school’s scatterplot (no one with her scores has been denied in the last 5 years from our large VA public HS.)

She was aware of this when she elected not to take AP foreign language senior year. The teacher at our HS is particularly ineffective - she has very low pass rates and there tend to be about 7 kids total left in that language by senior year because she is so terrible. Took double science instead.

I will try to remember to update this thread when I know the result.

Probably depends if her classmates are all taking a 4th year/AP. If so, could make it more difficult.

[Anonymous]

OP here. To be clear, I never said taking a language all four years was a “requirement.” I said not taking one was not a “good look.” And that’s what Dean J’s October post confirms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just wondering.

DD is a native speaker of Spanish but took 4 years of HS Spanish, including the AP class. Is this gonna be counted against her by the UVA?

Native or heritage speaker?

How would UVA know besides an essay? she could even be a family with heritage but gave up the language like: Germans, Italians, Irish, ...

4 or 5 years of Spanish is so common as is French, German, Latin, and soon Russian and Chinese. This wont move the needle either way. It will be a check box and then ignored.

Our pov is that it should - learning a language from scratch is much harder than having family support. Reality check is that for admissions it wont make or break the deal. Having no second language then that would mean something.

NP.

What about a 3rd language?

Does demonstrated proficiency in 3 languages matter to UVA ? (move the needle either way.? )

Depends on your angle; are you trying to get into a program that the 2nd and 3rd would be useful? Being fluent in 3 or more languages is more common than you think for areas like the DMV. A lot of these kids are high GPA/high SAT kids as well.

Europe, Asia, and Africa this is very common. IMHO mixing Romance languages like: French, Italian, Spanish, and Romanian is a lot easier than say Finish and Japanese.

[Anonymous]

The foreign language requirement is only for the college of arts and sciences.

“Students in UVA's College of Arts & Sciences must show proficiency in a second language.”