Letter to the Editor: Spanish requirements should be less about “busywork”

I am a Chemistry major currently entrenched in the Chemistry 212 and Physics 135 series to get that much closer to my degree. These classes are tough and require a seemingly infinite amount of time; however, this is understandable as I am a scientist at heart and need to take these classes. However, I am also taking the Spanish 121 series, which unfortunately takes too much time for me to concentrate on my major classes.

As we all know, WCAS has a foreign language requirement and I choose to fulfill mine with Spanish, the one language other than English that I have ever been exposed to. Little did I know that Spanish would be the class with the most busywork that isn't hard but time consuming — and very boring — I've had in college thus far. Each quarter has two exams, two compositions, two or three culture projects, quizzes and daily homework, and attendance is required at every class. The material isn't difficult, and yet this class has one to two hours worth of homework per class which is total busy work for a class in which the material can easily be learned in twenty minutes per week. It is clear that about 75 percent of my Spanish class is enrolled in the course strictly to fulfill the requirements, not to explore Spanish culture or become an expert in a language we will probably never use.

All of my other distro classes (sociology, sustainability and bioethics thus far) have been graded primarily on papers or exams and were meant to give students an introduction to the topic at hand. More importantly, the readings for these classes could be done at your own pace and never required busy work. I just wish the Spanish department would realize what their 121 series is used for by their students and assign a workload similar to the other commonly taken required classes of WCAS so I can use this time to focus on what I need to learn to one day become a great chemist.

Jon Leibowitz, Weinberg sophomore