Anonymous wrote:My kid who is now a college senior majoring in Chinese started the language in MS at Westland. My understanding from my younger kid is that Silver Creek (and maybe now Westland) have the option to study Chinese, but the students have to take the class at BCC.

Fwiw one of the challenges is finding Chinese teachers and maintaining sufficient numbers as the language gets more advanced. At BCC the more advanced classes were taught together (Chinese 4, AP, IB) because they didn't have sufficient enrollment for individual classes. A lot of native speakers or people who have some exposure to the language enroll in the introductory level(s) but opt not to go the distance to AP or IB.

I do share your concern OP - there's no way my kid would be a Chinese major without early exposure to the language (not a native speaker and no ancestral connection) so I totally agree that MCPS should make this more widely available. But there are other considerations at play here.