UVA and 4 years of foreign language

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: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.

Still disagree.

SEAS students get away with not taking 4 years of FL. Anyone saying it's not a problem for Arts and Sciences is kidding themselves. If UVA is your student's dream school, it is a big mistake to not take 4 years of FL and not to take APUSH if you are from NoVa.

I graduated from UVA SEAS. Every UVA SEAS student I knew had taken 4 years of a FL. Admission odds clearly are better if the applicant takes 4 yrs of a single FL. Yes, exceptions will exist.

Also, SEAS students had higher median SAT Verbal test scores than CLAS students, in addition to having higher median SAT Math scores. We were told that had been true for many decades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: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.

Still disagree.

SEAS students get away with not taking 4 years of FL. Anyone saying it's not a problem for Arts and Sciences is kidding themselves. If UVA is your student's dream school, it is a big mistake to not take 4 years of FL and not to take APUSH if you are from NoVa.

My UVA student did take 4 years of FL. Did NOT take APUSH. They were clearly a stem kid and focused on that while also taking high rigor across the board, just not APUSH. There is always an exception I guess, maybe this is where the holistic admissions really plays in.

Why skip APUSH?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: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.

Still disagree.

SEAS students get away with not taking 4 years of FL. Anyone saying it's not a problem for Arts and Sciences is kidding themselves. If UVA is your student's dream school, it is a big mistake to not take 4 years of FL and not to take APUSH if you are from NoVa.

My UVA student did take 4 years of FL. Did NOT take APUSH. They were clearly a stem kid and focused on that while also taking high rigor across the board, just not APUSH. There is always an exception I guess, maybe this is where the holistic admissions really plays in.

Why skip APUSH?

It’s not needed. Furthermore it’s a big risk for getting a bad grade on account of how hard it is.

[Anonymous]

I think some people are confusing “4 years of the same foreign language” and “4 years of foreign language IN HIGH SCHOOL.”

The problem is that many students begin in 7th grade, so they’ve had 4 years by 10th grade and 5 years by 11th grade.

We are not discussing whether or not a student should reach 4-5 years of study in the same language. (I think they should.) We are discussing whether or not a high stats student, who began FL in 7th grade and has reached level 5 by 11th grade will be denied admission simply for not taking level 6/AP in 12th grade. Particularly if that student has an otherwise rigorous course load and is dropping the 6th year of language to take another hard class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think some people are confusing “4 years of the same foreign language” and “4 years of foreign language IN HIGH SCHOOL.”

The problem is that many students begin in 7th grade, so they’ve had 4 years by 10th grade and 5 years by 11th grade.

We are not discussing whether or not a student should reach 4-5 years of study in the same language. (I think they should.) We are discussing whether or not a high stats student, who began FL in 7th grade and has reached level 5 by 11th grade will be denied admission simply for not taking level 6/AP in 12th grade. Particularly if that student has an otherwise rigorous course load and is dropping the 6th year of language to take another hard class.

This is correct. My niece is applying to Princeton after having completed FL year 4 in 10th grade, with no AP or any other FL in 11th or 12th. I don't think I would recommend this since her high school does have the AP course, but she really wanted to double up on science junior year as a STEM kid. I don't know if I would have recommended this route since Princeton has a FL requirement, but we will see if it has an impact on admissions.

[Anonymous]

It does not seem to be a disqualifer as much as it's a "nice to have."

As in, it's "nice to have" on your application some of the following:

Certain difficult AP courses (APUSH, Chem, etc.)
Captain of a varsity sport
Strong examples of service and/or leadership

But lacking one of these things alone is not a disqualifer. IMO.

[Anonymous]

Exceptions will exist at every college to any Admissions "rule" or guideline. This is not hard to understand.

Why do we have to rehash the UVa FL rule - guideline monthly?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let's see if this works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It does not seem to be a disqualifer as much as it's a "nice to have."

As in, it's "nice to have" on your application some of the following:

Certain difficult AP courses (APUSH, Chem, etc.)
Captain of a varsity sport
Strong examples of service and/or leadership

But lacking one of these things alone is not a disqualifer. IMO.

+1

[Anonymous]

BUT I REALLY REALLLLLLLLLLLLLY DON'T WANT TO TAKE A FOREIGN LANGUAGE FOR 4 YERS!!!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: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.

Still disagree.

SEAS students get away with not taking 4 years of FL. Anyone saying it's not a problem for Arts and Sciences is kidding themselves. If UVA is your student's dream school, it is a big mistake to not take 4 years of FL and not to take APUSH if you are from NoVa.

My UVA student did take 4 years of FL. Did NOT take APUSH. They were clearly a stem kid and focused on that while also taking high rigor across the board, just not APUSH. There is always an exception I guess, maybe this is where the holistic admissions really plays in.

Why skip APUSH?

It’s not needed. Furthermore it’s a big risk for getting a bad grade on account of how hard it is.

You've been warned. Skip APUSH at your own risk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:BUT I REALLY REALLLLLLLLLLLLLY DON'T WANT TO TAKE A FOREIGN LANGUAGE FOR 4 YERS!!!!!

And you don't have to. You can still attend UVA if your app has enough other stuff.

[Anonymous]

My kid started spanish in MCPS in 6th. They're in AP Spanish (Spanish 6) in 11th. If they don't want to take Spanish again next year, UVA can pound sand if they want to consider that a strike. Their SAT verbal is an 800.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:BUT I REALLY REALLLLLLLLLLLLLY DON'T WANT TO TAKE A FOREIGN LANGUAGE FOR 4 YERS!!!!!

And you don't have to. You can still attend UVA if your app has enough other stuff.

This. And that is why these threads keep popping up. Because some posters don’t believe this. But it’s true.

[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.

I am back with an update. She’s in! No foreign language senior year.