My daughter (in 10th grade) is looking for some advice. She’s currently scheduled to take Honors Spanish 4 next term, but she’s thinking of switching to regular Physics instead and moving Spanish 4 to her senior year. From a college application perspective, would that be okay/? There will be a significant gap from Spanish 3 to Spanish 4.
As with everything … it depends!
In general, schools love to see 4 years of all 5 academic subjects - English, math, social studies, science, foreign language. And in science they like to see bio, chem & physics.
How you fit courses over the 4 years is, I believe, less of a concern. Although colleges like to see a student progressively challenging themselves.
Also important to consider—what is your kid’s likely focus in college and what type of college are they considering?
Here are my life examples, my D22 was a STEM girl interested in highly rejectives. She did only 3 years of social studies, but did 6 years of math. Attends a highly rejective LAC for comp sci.
My S24 dropped a foreign language after year 3 to have more room for business electives. At that time, we checked the requirements at the big universities on his radar. Most required only 3 years of language to avoid taking more language in college (which he did not want to do). He attends a Big 10 school for business, and he was glad he’d had some accounting before he got there.
My S28 wants to study music (likely music ed). We are currently trying to figure out what he can whittle off of the 4x5 requirements to take more music classes. The school is really only set up for 1 or 2 electives a year, and he wants 3. 
What is making your daughter want to add physics now? My gut says the year off Spanish is fine (although she may need some extra review the summer before she gives back in).
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Speaking less from the college application perspective and more from a language learning perspective, going from having her last Spanish class in December 2025 and then not having it again until August 2027 or January 2028 is a LONG gap, especially for people who are not yet at the fluency stage. From the foreign language perspective, I’d consider it inadvisable.
In terms of college admissions, it likely depends on what type of college your kid is interested in and in how much Spanish your school offers (i.e. is Spanish 4 the last class offered, or do they offer more?). If your kid is looking at schools with low admit rates, then those schools are probably going to want a foreign language every year, if it’s available. At schools that aren’t very selective, it may not make much of a difference one way or the other as to when she takes Spanish 4.
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First time poster with a D28. She is tiptoeing into thinking about college and considering her priorities. We have visited two strong in-state options already for unofficial tours with friends already at each, and plan at least a few more low key visits this year to schools within an hour or two to continue to see different types of schools (large/small, urban/suburban and so on).
I am doing a lot of the initial research both on colleges to potentially explore and on the process generally. Her high school’s counseling department is good but around here lots of families also hire private counselors. If I can save that $5K I will, so right now I’m a lot more immersed in CC, books and podcasts learning about the big picture.
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Welcome to CC, @DogMom72! I love that you’ve started with low-key visits of nearby colleges. There are lots of knowledgeable folks on the board who are happy to give advice and share what they know. All you need to do is ask!
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Welcome! I think starting local, or in places you already are makes sense! We did that with S26. S28 has seen a lot of colleges because he’s the youngest and gets dragged along.
Are other people choosing classes? Junior year is the first year they have much choice at S28’s school.
I live in rural Alaska, on the internet to learn this stuff since it’s been a long time since I went to college, and have no one in person to ask. Kids both homeschooled, but officially public school students (it’s an AK thing). My oldest is class of 27, but I have a 28 just behind her who is watching older sister and I trying to plan, and just starting to think about colleges. D28 is probably a great liberal arts type kid, and toying with the idea of a women only school. Might want to major in English or Biology, also likes art and art history, is taking both Spanish and French, and would love to get close to fluent in both in high school if she can. May or may not get to visit anywhere – it’s expensive and far.
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Not until spring, but already has a pretty good idea of what she will take next year.
AP Latin
AP English
APUSH
AP Calculus A/B
Honors Physics or AP Bio
Honors Chorus
Theology (mandatory)
Chorus obviously helps her GPA less than another academic course but she loves it so since she already has a massive load, it will be fine. It looks brutal but based on her current grades in a mix of honors and AP classes, and college expectations of max rigor there really isn’t another choice. PE requirement satisfied via varsity sports, and this summer she will take a .5 credit course in digital branding to satisfy the technology requirement it’s virtual and two weeks long Fairly easy is our understanding
As a homeschooler, we can choose classes up until the very last minute (or even switch within the semester if we really need to). That said, I know it’s important to try and have a couple live online classes junior year to get recommendations from, and those fill up. So I’ll probably try to find a good AP English one for her when they open up in the spring, and probably some kind of live social studies as well (she still needs a world history credit, not sure whether she wants to go AP for that or not). Otherwise, she’ll probably do AP French, Spanish 4, Anatomy and Physiology, Precalculus, and some other elective that might be online DE
At the colleges that request/require two teacher recommendations, they usually want one from the humanities/social sciences and one from math/science, so you may want to make sure she gets signed up for live online classes in those two different buckets.
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Is that true for liberal arts schools too? I have seen that for STEM schools my oldest is looking at (like MIT), because I assume they want to know the kid can write something other than problem sets. But I didn’t know that a liberal arts school might require the same thing from a potential English major.
My understanding is that it is generally recommended for any school that requires two teacher recommendations, whether it’s a liberal arts college or a STEM-heavy school. Perhaps @Mwfan1921 or @Lindagaf have more insight to share?