The Language Requirement

The Rules

• Students must complete their Foreign Language Requirement by the end of their seventh term in residence.  (“Residence” includes study abroad on a Dartmouth Program, LSA, LSA+ or FSP)
• The Language Requirement can be fulfilled by:

1. Placing out (either through a placement test or individual evaluation done by the appropriate department).
2. Completing the requirement through Dartmouth coursework. This involves completion of study through level 3 (i.e. SPAN 3, GRK 3, CHIN 3).   This can be done either on campus or through one of the LSA (+) programs.  Some languages (Latin, Portuguese) can be done in two terms.

• Courses used to fulfill the language requirement cannot also be used to fulfill Distributive Requirements.
• A student cannot NRO a language course being used for the fulfillment of the Language Requirements.
• Placement tests are offered at the beginning of the year in: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Russian, and Spanish.
• Students proficient in a language not taught at Dartmouth (such as Navajo or Swedish) can obtain an exemption from the Language Requirement.  They must contact Professor David A. Peterson (646-4024).

Advising Tips for Languages

• A student should have a clear plan about how s/he is going to fulfill the language requirement, even if s/he is not going to study that language in the first or second term on campus.
• A first-year student who has placed out of some but not all of a language sequence should be advised to complete the needed courses as soon as possible. The longer s/he waits to pick it up the rustier s/he will be and the more difficulty s/he will have.  Putting it off will frequently result in problems later on.
• A student should consider early on whether or not s/he wants to do foreign study, and when.  A student should avoid taking the last pre-requisite more than two terms before going on the LSA (+).
• Encourage students who have not thought about it to consider foreign study (LSA or LSA+) associated with the language s/he will fulfill the requirement with.  A student need not major in the language, and these programs are often some of the most important a Dartmouth student will have during their entire curriculum.
• Students must earn a B- or better in the 1-2 sequences to go on the LSAs to Germany, France, Spain and Italy.