Exactly.

The suburbs have sizeable bilingual immigrant communities that don't speak Spanish, unlike DC. Suburban immigrants lobby to have their languages taught in public middle schools and high schools. I have a sibling w/a spouse from Korea. They live in Fairfax and send their kids to heavily Asian Oakton HS, which teaches not just Mandarin, but Korean, Vietnamese and Japanese. The best big suburban high schools generally teach all 7 AP languages: French, Spanish, German, Italian, Latin, Japanese, Chinese. They also might teach Russian, Arabic and one or two more Asian languages.

DC public schools tend not to get pushback if they only offer French and Spanish, and possibly Mandarin (JR, Walls, DCI, BASIS). To my knowledge, on Latin teaches Arabic. None of them bother with AP German, right. Just no political incentive to offer more languages.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

We live in the US and the Americas and Spain is a large enough swath of the world for it to be worth it. Who outside of Western Europe gives a rat’s butt about German?

We do. Most my ancestors were from Germany, I was an exchange student with Youth for Understanding in Munich for a year in high school and concentrated in German at an Ivy. I've work for the Dept. of Commerce in a job where I've often used my German for the past 20 years.

The question you should be asking is why many strong suburban middle and high schools in this Metro area routinely offer between half a dozen and a dozen languages from 6th grade while our DC public schools tend to offer no more than one, two or three, not very seriously as that other than perhaps for Spanish at DCI and maybe J-R.

This. It's especially embarrassing for a city as international as DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

We live in the US and the Americas and Spain is a large enough swath of the world for it to be worth it. Who outside of Western Europe gives a rat’s butt about German?

We do. Most my ancestors were from Germany, I was an exchange student with Youth for Understanding in Munich for a year in high school and concentrated in German at an Ivy. I've work for the Dept. of Commerce in a job where I've often used my German for the past 20 years.

The question you should be asking is why many strong suburban middle and high schools in this Metro area routinely offer between half a dozen and a dozen languages from 6th grade while our DC public schools tend to offer no more than one, two or three, not very seriously as that other than perhaps for Spanish at DCI and maybe J-R.

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

+100!

pp, I meant to say even though most locals understand English very well.

Anonymous wrote:I’ve learned plenty of German and found I never had a use for it. I visited Germany where I have ancestry, Switzerland where I have family, and have never had any reason for it to do anything but atrophy after that.

In the end utility is the name of the game.

In Austria, it's really tough to survive without German, even though most locals understand it very well.

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

We live in the US and the Americas and Spain is a large enough swath of the world for it to be worth it. Who outside of Western Europe gives a rat’s butt about German?

Anonymous wrote:Everyone i know who wants their kids to learn German (usually have German heritage) go to German Saturday school somewhere in the burbs (there are all DC people). Seems great.

This is the Saturday school: https://giswashington.org/GLC.html

I think it's quite good.

Anonymous wrote:This probably doesn’t help you but several of the Loudoun county middle schools do.

Yes, German seems more accessible in NoVa. I can't remember exactly where her kids go to school but I met someone recently whose kids are at a German immersion elementary in Fairfax or Arlington. Public school. I had never heard of German immersion at all -- I think that's great it's an option.

I get the arguments for Spanish, Chinese, and French, but there is absolutely no reason why DC high schools, at least, wouldn't offer at least two years of German. First off, there will be many kids in DC who are at a high level of proficiency in Spanish/Chinese/French by high school due to immersion programs, so offering other options as a second language makes sense. Second, there are a huge number of people in this area with German heritage, and the international nature of DC means that an above average number of people in this area wind up working abroad or working for foreign companies and organizations. German has plenty of potential practical uses.

DC has a Hebrew immersion school so I'm not sure that "usefulness" should be the only metric used here.

I grew up in a small town in one of those big square states in the middle of the country and my HS offered German up to AP. Also offered Spanish, French, and Mandarin, though they had trouble recruiting teachers for the Mandarin classes so that program was not as robust.

This probably doesn’t help you but several of the Loudoun county middle schools do.

Anonymous wrote:Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

Really glib, but the general experience of most Americans I know is that almost every interaction until you're into far rural Germany is much more likely to be better conducted in English, i.e., they speak it well or OK, and your German is rudimentary. So unless you're headed to a longterm experience, getting to middling German in a US high school doesn't facilitate better communication.

Annoying, but . . . you're going to probably say I'm a philistine and my kids should just try harder and get better at it. So we can go to rural parts of three countries. For more than a month at a time, I guess.

Everyone i know who wants their kids to learn German (usually have German heritage) go to German Saturday school somewhere in the burbs (there are all DC people). Seems great.

Love how this thread immediately turned into a bunch of self-declared language-experts asserting that German is a worthless foreign language So American.

Barely any American learns ANY foreign language to a degree where they can really communicate with it. If "Utility is the name of the game" quit foreign languages altogether. YOu already (more or less) speak the world-ruling language, which is English.

Every bigger foreign language in the US has been in severe decline except Spanish, which is mainly a reason of the failing US education system (only in 16 of 50 states is exposure to a foreign language mandatory to get a high school degree). French, German, Italian, Portuguese... cuz y'all "experts" can't see the value in them it means they're dead in your eyes.

Go ahead, focus on your precious Spanish. No one outside the Americas and Spain itself gives a rat's but about Spanish. Can say that about every language (except English).

Anonymous wrote:I have to agree with PPs that the juice isn’t worth the squeeze with German. I worked hard to reach a high level of fluency and it hasn’t really been useful aside from a couple translation monkey projects at work.

100%. After Spanish and Chinese, you are far better off studying French, Arabic, or Portuguese.

Take German classes on your own time and dime.