Reply to World Language transfer request for HS

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Reply to "World Language transfer request for HS"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here. The other option would be to offer all WL at every high school. This is just as important a reason to seek a pupil placement as IB-AP. I really couldn't care less about going to Langley (it's actually a hassle because I would have to adjust my work schedule to fit this), but my son is set on taking Russian as an additional WL. I don't even know how people are saying take it online.  It's not available online to take.  Neither FCPS Online nor Virtual VA offer Russian.  [/quote]

There aren't enough qualified teachers to do this.  Nor is there enough interest in many of the languages or even students enrolled in the high schools to offer every single language at every single high school.  FCPS offers around 3-4 languages at every high school, a few more at the large high schools where the student body and classroom allocation/building size can support more languages.

Usually, every high school has Spanish and French.  They will then have a combination of 1-3 additional languages depending on the size of the school, some combination of German, Japanese, Latin, American Sign Language, Farsi, Mandarin, Korean, Russian or Arabic (perhaps more).  Most high schools have between 400-650 students per grade.  Not even the 600-750 students per grade schools could support a dozen languages. They would not have enough students, teachers or classroom space.

FCPS has somewhere around 55,000 high school students.

They cannot make everything exactly perfect and convenient for all 55,000 high school students.

At some point, you are either going to have to be inconvenienced to get what you want, including paying for private language instruction, taking the language online, moving to a new school pyramid that offers your desired language, or accepting that your kid might have to take one of the other 3-5 foreign languages offered at your high school, which is far more languages than the vast majority of high schools in this country.

In a district this large, not everything can be perfect for every person.

If language transfers are closed, then they are closed.

Work with the solutions you have at your school, pay for private language options,  or move.[/quote]

I agree with everything that you wrote.

[b]I can understand the OP being upset because the change in pupil placing for language is new and very recent. I don’t think they did a good job discussing it or letting people know it was happening. [/b]OPs kid could have pupil placed for Russian last year and now cannot. That is annoying and upseting. A kid moving from McLean to Langley is not the kids that people were worried about with the pupil placements. Herndon to Langley, yes.

My concern is that the county is going to restrict world language to only a few at every school in the name of equity. Then do they choose the languages that have immersion programs? Japanese,  Korean, French, Spanish and German? Then there are kids who lose out on a variety of other languages that are well attended at their current school.

OP, I get that it sucks for your kid and I am sorry that the option doesn’t exist for them. You might need to look into after school classes or a weekend program or your child might need to wait until college. [/quote]

I had no idea until I saw it here. Now left wondering what is going to happen to DD. She has three years of language under her belt, and it's not offered online or through Virtual Virginia. Not having at least 4 years of a WL affects college outcomes.[/quote]

Your daughter is a junior in high school?

Fcps always grandfathers rising seniors when they change things.[/quote]

DP. My daughter also is in 3rd year of WL and is a freshman, due to having participated in immersion in ES. But college admissions wants 4 years of 1 WL, all taken during the HS years. It isn’t just rising seniors affected by this.[/quote]

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