<p>I know I already referenced this point in my very short post, but Himom’s “2 years of Mandarin doesn’t sound like all that much of a language in & of itself” inspired me to track down my mother and get her opinion on how useful 2 years of Chinese would be. My mother teaches Chinese at a prestigious, top-tier college that, it feels, most CC denizens apply to. She was understandably reluctant to offer any sort of a final opinion - how far two years carries you really varies from student to student, textbook to textbook, class to class (although I would think that a Chinese class that has just begun might be less settled down in terms of quality than a long-established Chinese class, just from personal experience). Last year, they had one 2-years-of-learning kid who placed in a surprising level 4, where newspapers and excerpts from novels and short stories are read daily, while many more 4-years-of-learning were asked to begin again completely from scratch. But in the end she conceded that two years of learning “would probably start from the beginning,” which sounds about right. Nothing unexpected, but I thought I’d provide this little conversation in case any other thread lurkers are taking Chinese and interested. Your college may have less challenging Chinese programs; this Chinese department is known for being exacting.</p>
<p>I guess I just wanted to give some (redundant?) back-up to my opinion that two years of Chinese at the typical high school level is essentially dabbling and will not help much, although I also concede that it’s very good to demonstrate a range of passions!</p>