When I was in sixth grade, I decided to take Spanish 1A because all my friends were taking it. It was a fun experience until Covid hit and I had to take Spanish 1B online.
During online school that year, we were learning about conjugations – a core part of speaking Spanish – and it was hard for me to learn the information without being face-to-face. In my next two years of Spanish, I knew my weak spot was conjugating, but I was able to get through Spanish 2 and Spanish 3 fine. I decided to continue and enroll in Spanish 4 for my sophomore year. During the first week, I felt lost every time I would walk into the class as I could not get by with my weak conjugation skills. I also still had my fine arts and technology education credits to complete, so I decided to drop it to make room for the credits I needed.
LIke me, as students get further into high school and take more rigorous schedules, a world language may no longer meet their needs. Dual enrollment, internships, double period classes and AP classes take precedence for juniors and seniors, making it hard for them to make space for a language. “I take AP Chemistry, which is a double period and leaves little flexibility in my schedule. I decided to not take Spanish this year because I had no more room for it and it is not a subject I am extremely interested in, but chemistry is,” junior Danielle Rubin said.
One reason why Spanish in particular sees a large number of students dropping the class is the large number of students who take it in the first place. World language resource teacher and Spanish teacher Dr. James Fetterman said, “I think a large part of it is that Spanish is easily the most popular language students decide to take and once students get the credits they need, they don’t have room for it in their schedule anymore. Most students take Spanish up until level 3.”
Students in MCPS are required to take two credits of a world language, whether that be in middle school or high school, by the time they graduate. Spanish is the most popular language that students choose. The world language enrollment at this school is actually higher than the MCPS average, with “our enrollment being around 70% and the MCPS average being 60%,” Fetterman said.
Students who do continue on find the higher levels require much from them. “I am in AP Spanish right now and do see why students drop it after level three, as it definitely requires a lot more effort and interest once you get to the higher levels. A lot of my friends stopped taking it after level three because they thought it got too hard and time consuming,” junior Bryson Filbert said.
