UVA info session today said “most rigorous in ALL 5 core subjects.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is foreign language required but advanced music or art is not?

More likely to continue music and art after high school than school foreign language.

Ummm no. No one does art or music. Everyone needs another language.

Ok, I’ve posted twice now about how my daughter who is at UVA stopped French after four years.
She also took drama each year of HS. That being said took APs in all her other classes, went past BC Calc, and scored above a 1500 on her SAT.

This is my kid, too, except trade drama for music. So that’s two “no one’s” at UVA.

[Anonymous]

They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh, and you have to get all A’s in these classes.

And a 34+/1500+

And awesome EC’s.

Good luck. No pressure.

This is just not true. Stop the BS.

They are not lying. Go look at the SCHEV report. Last year's inciming class reported a 34 at the 75th percentile: 33 at the median. SAT scores were 1510 at the 75th percentile; 1470 at the median. GPA is 4.51 at the 75th percentile.

If unhooked, your student should be aiming for 75th percentile or higher, especially if from NOVA, where where is the most competition is from.

also top 6% of class

also national awards.

also many top ECs.


Go to Reddit or College Confidential and look at the stats of applicants who were waitlisted or denied

[Anonymous]

What percentage of Americans or for that matter UVA grads actually use the foreign language they took in high school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is foreign language required but advanced music or art is not?

More likely to continue music and art after high school than school foreign language.

Ummm no. No one does art or music. Everyone needs another language.

Ok, I’ve posted twice now about how my daughter who is at UVA stopped French after four years.
She also took drama each year of HS. That being said took APs in all her other classes, went past BC Calc, and scored above a 1500 on her SAT.

was she hooked? from a less populated county? a legacy when legacy counted?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, duh. How is this surprising?

+2 This is their mantra. How are you surprised, OP? Reach the AP level in all 5 core subjects. The real question is whether they care if you take AB Calc vs. BC Calc or APES vs. AP Biology. Do they “rank” the APs by rigor?

Not OP, but I wouldn’t consider Foreign Language to be a core subject. I should mention that my daughter is currently at UVA after taking four years of a FL and my nephew who only took three years of Spanish was accepted to UVA (10 years ago)

It doesn’t matter what you consider a core subject, it matters what UVA a core subject. Also, UVA is one of many top schools that expects 4 years of world language. It is the norm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, duh. How is this surprising?

+2 This is their mantra. How are you surprised, OP? Reach the AP level in all 5 core subjects. The real question is whether they care if you take AB Calc vs. BC Calc or APES vs. AP Biology. Do they “rank” the APs by rigor?

Not OP, but I wouldn’t consider Foreign Language to be a core subject. I should mention that my daughter is currently at UVA after taking four years of a FL and my nephew who only took three years of Spanish was accepted to UVA (10 years ago)

It doesn’t matter what you consider a core subject, it matters what UVA a core subject. Also, UVA is one of many top schools that expects 4 years of world language. It is the norm.

*it matters what UVA considers a core subject

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh, and you have to get all A’s in these classes.

And a 34+/1500+

And awesome EC’s.

Good luck. No pressure.

This is just not true. Stop the BS.

They are not lying. Go look at the SCHEV report. Last year's inciming class reported a 34 at the 75th percentile: 33 at the median. SAT scores were 1510 at the 75th percentile; 1470 at the median. GPA is 4.51 at the 75th percentile.

If unhooked, your student should be aiming for 75th percentile or higher, especially if from NOVA, where where is the most competition is from.

also top 6% of class

also national awards.

also many top ECs.


Go to Reddit or College Confidential and look at the stats of applicants who were waitlisted or denied

Just go test optional. UVA accepts a lot of kids test optional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

+1. To the point about UVA needing to set firm guidelines because it us a public school with relatively fewer dollars spent on atteacting and selecting students, note that UVA received almost 60,000 applicatioms last year for only 4,400 seats. It takes money to process that many applications so priorities must be set. All of the top flagship publics have rules, guidelines, cut-offs, etc to help them balance out in-state from OOS, URM (yes they are still doing that to get around the scotus decision), full freight vs scholarship, whatever Asian-American goals/limits it wants to reach, and so in, so that the University can arrive at 4,400 students fitting all of its goals. Not an easy task.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

+1. To the point about UVA needing to set firm guidelines because it us a public school with relatively fewer dollars spent on atteacting and selecting students, note that UVA received almost 60,000 applicatioms last year for only 4,400 seats. It takes money to process that many applications so priorities must be set. All of the top flagship publics have rules, guidelines, cut-offs, etc to help them balance out in-state from OOS, URM (yes they are still doing that to get around the scotus decision), full freight vs scholarship, whatever Asian-American goals/limits it wants to reach, and so in, so that the University can arrive at 4,400 students fitting all of its goals. Not an easy task.

But this isn’t a firm line. UVA takes tons of kids OOS and from urban and rural Virginia without four years of language in high school/AP language. It’s only a few high schools in NOVA where kids have to meet this standard.

[Anonymous]

DS chose Spanish 5 vs AP Spanish. Hope that works!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

+1. To the point about UVA needing to set firm guidelines because it us a public school with relatively fewer dollars spent on atteacting and selecting students, note that UVA received almost 60,000 applicatioms last year for only 4,400 seats. It takes money to process that many applications so priorities must be set. All of the top flagship publics have rules, guidelines, cut-offs, etc to help them balance out in-state from OOS, URM (yes they are still doing that to get around the scotus decision), full freight vs scholarship, whatever Asian-American goals/limits it wants to reach, and so in, so that the University can arrive at 4,400 students fitting all of its goals. Not an easy task.

But this isn’t a firm line. UVA takes tons of kids OOS and from urban and rural Virginia without four years of language in high school/AP language. It’s only a few high schools in NOVA where kids have to meet this standard.

Thats not true and you know it. Plenty of examples on this forum and in our school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

+1. To the point about UVA needing to set firm guidelines because it us a public school with relatively fewer dollars spent on atteacting and selecting students, note that UVA received almost 60,000 applicatioms last year for only 4,400 seats. It takes money to process that many applications so priorities must be set. All of the top flagship publics have rules, guidelines, cut-offs, etc to help them balance out in-state from OOS, URM (yes they are still doing that to get around the scotus decision), full freight vs scholarship, whatever Asian-American goals/limits it wants to reach, and so in, so that the University can arrive at 4,400 students fitting all of its goals. Not an easy task.

But this isn’t a firm line. UVA takes tons of kids OOS and from urban and rural Virginia without four years of language in high school/AP language. It’s only a few high schools in NOVA where kids have to meet this standard.

Thats not true and you know it. Plenty of examples on this forum and in our school.

I’m not sure what you think I’m wrong about. Our OOS high school only offers 3 years of language, and kids get into UVA. Maybe you think I’m wrong that there’s a higher standard for students from better-resourced high schools? Either way, the PP who said UVA has a “bright line” on this question is wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They want four years in HS, not just four years. I posted above about my daughter (a senior) taking AP French. This is her fifth year of language and she is only taking it because UVA wouldn’t count her first year which was taken in 8th grade.

To the PP who says colleges get to set their criteria, yes, that’s true. But this rigid foreign language criteria for a public flagship versus a private school is frustrating.

But UVA has to set bright lines. It is a state school with a small (compared to privates) admissions office. As explained above, UVA wants to see those kids who can tough it out even in a course they don't like and still get an A because that demonstrates a love of learning or grit. Those are the students who will succeed at UVA. Also UVA sees itself as training citizens of the world (like Jefferson) who will increasingly need to communicate in many languages in order to succeed in a future business and social world dominated less by English (hint!! Take Chinese! now! Get fluent!)

+1. To the point about UVA needing to set firm guidelines because it us a public school with relatively fewer dollars spent on atteacting and selecting students, note that UVA received almost 60,000 applicatioms last year for only 4,400 seats. It takes money to process that many applications so priorities must be set. All of the top flagship publics have rules, guidelines, cut-offs, etc to help them balance out in-state from OOS, URM (yes they are still doing that to get around the scotus decision), full freight vs scholarship, whatever Asian-American goals/limits it wants to reach, and so in, so that the University can arrive at 4,400 students fitting all of its goals. Not an easy task.

But this isn’t a firm line. UVA takes tons of kids OOS and from urban and rural Virginia without four years of language in high school/AP language. It’s only a few high schools in NOVA where kids have to meet this standard.

Thats not true and you know it. Plenty of examples on this forum and in our school.

I’m not sure what you think I’m wrong about. Our OOS high school only offers 3 years of language, and kids get into UVA. Maybe you think I’m wrong that there’s a higher standard for students from better-resourced high schools? Either way, the PP who said UVA has a “bright line” on this question is wrong.

If your high school truly offers only 3 years of all languages and kids get into UVA then these kids are hooked, in ways you may not be aware of . ( or have super excelled in Stem related courses in high school and have explained that in the essay)