Point: Bryce Morrison
Foreign language classes are a staple in current-day high school education, but the significance placed on these classes is excessive.
For starters, making a foreign language a graduation requirement puts added stress on students. With many students taking courses at an advanced or accelerated level, as well as having after-school commitments such as sports, clubs, or caring for siblings, time management can become an issue. Imagine the added stress that comes from learning a whole new language and the frustration that comes from it. Even students who have relatively easier courses, or students who have little to no commitments outside of the classroom, still have to balance a seven-class course load, which is challenging by itself.
I’ve experienced this firsthand during my first two years at WJ when I took French. Having to complete tedious assignments and worrying about committing conjugations and verb tenses to memory while also going to baseball practice every day after school was incredibly challenging, and my overall grades suffered as a result. Once I finished my two years of French, my grades immediately bounced back, even though I still had commitments outside of the classroom. It was clear to me that the stress of learning a new language was negatively affecting my schoolwork and time management.
A lot of my friends have asked the same question. Why should I learn a language if the area I want to study doesn’t relate to or require it? The number of degrees and fields of study in college that require proficiency in another language is minuscule. Degrees that do require proficiency in a second language often require the student to take language courses at the university, even if it means repeating courses or material learned in high school.
Clearly, universities believe that high school language education is obsolete or not beneficial, and there are very obvious reasons why that is. The use of AI and translators in high school language courses is more prevalent now than ever before. Students who lack the motivation or dedication to learning a new language use sites like ChatGPT or Google Translate to easily complete assignments. The problem is that these sites are unreliable at best, and they often butcher conjugations and other grammar rules. I’m one of the students who often chose the easy route, and many of my assignments in French class were completed with the aid of Google Translate. Oftentimes, my assignments would come back with grammatical mistakes, but my test scores never wavered. The combination of grading that is too facile and the heavy use of AI and translators in language courses makes it easy to see that high school language courses provide little to no substantial knowledge for kids who don’t choose to put in the work, which is increasingly more and more students.
The idea that learning a second language makes a student “more well rounded” is an outdated philosophy. Students should spend more time being active in their community or focusing on subjects that they may want to pursue a career in. The only way for high schools to promote individuality and produce inspired children is by letting the students choose whether or not they want to take a language, not forcing it upon them.
Counterpoint: Dea Krasniqi
The two years of taking a world language class don’t just teach you how to say “hello” or hold a basic conversation, they can be valuable in a multitude of ways. Learning a foreign language in high school—while it’s still much easier to retain the information—can challenge one to see outside the bubble of their own culture or community.
In Ryan Martinez’s French class, for example, he often challenges his students to understand deeper and more complex parts of French culture rather than simply learning the language and passing the class. Martinez includes units on the different cultures of Francophone countries, from Algeria to areas in Switzerland to France itself and many more. In these units, students explore topics as nuanced as politics all the way down to simple ones, like traditional foods served.
These lessons enable a student to discover the vast differences between countries and cultures that may be difficult to see if they’ve lived in one place their whole life. Learning about these differences before they enter the real world past high school helps students understand the beauty in how each culture and language is unique. It’s not just about learning the language—anyone could open Duolingo on their phone and do it at home—when it’s required in high school, it allows you to connect with your peers and learn collectively about something unfamiliar, which may seem like delving into a whole new world.
It’s also important to note how much easier it is for a student to learn a language while they are in their adolescence to teen years—which is marked by a critical period for learning a language. During this period, it is much easier to learn and absorb another language’s grammar and rules, as a child’s fluid intelligence is still growing.
Many students complain that they shouldn’t have to learn a language if they don’t intend to follow through with it and study it in college. The truth is, high school is an important time in your life where you have to explore your options and experience some uncomfortable things in order to discover their passion. Sticking with something, even if it is just for two years, teaches discipline. In life you can’t always chalk your decisions up to not wanting to do something; there are dozens of things in high school that lots of students think they could live without but are required, like SSL hours or core classes past a certain grade.
Language teachers don’t expect you to completely master fluency in a language, especially after just four semesters — it’s the challenge that they emphasize. Being in a language class is arguably just as demanding as some of your core classes given the right teacher and environment — it requires focus and concentration, and immerses you in that setting, even if it is just for 45 minutes.
