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Many students spend years in Spanish classes and never reach their goal to speak the language. “I began Spanish I in the seventh grade,” said junior Lindsay Bouchacourt. “I followed through with it to Spanish IV last year, and I managed to get all A’s.”

Lindsay’s story is like my own: after a difficult year in Spanish IV, the only place left to progress was to AP Spanish V, a very difficult course requiring full comprehension and the ability to analyze Spanish stories. Lindsay and I made the same choice: not to take AP Spanish and give up learning the language.

“A lot of people at Heritage have been taking Spanish since the first grade, but aren’t able to take AP Spanish and end up feeling shortchanged because they can’t complete the program,” said junior Anna Joykutty.

“There should be separate Spanish V honors and AP Spanish V classes for people who want to continue learning the language they’ve been learning all their lives,” suggested Lindsay.

One may wonder why after so many years in Spanish classes the students still cannot speak the language well enough to enter an AP class. A possible explanation is that English-speaking students are not receiving enough attention in the Spanish IV class. Spanish teacher Mrs. Mulholland explained, “Spanish IV classes are for both native Spanish speakers and native English speakers. They each have separate areas of the language that they need the most help with. It would be interesting to have a Spanish IV class dedicated to native speakers, and a separate class dedicated to non-native speakers.”

For example, irregular conjugation is a typical issue that most native speakers have. However, this is usually not a problem for non-native speakers, who need to focus more on reading comprehension. “In the classes we have now, students learning Spanish as a second language have to compete with fluent speakers. I’m sure parents would like to see classes specifically targeted for their child,” said Mrs. Mulholland.

Many Heritage students spend years attempting to learn another language, but with our school’s Spanish program, they never get the chance to reach that goal.