Chinese minor, how will this look?

[Shingo123]

So, I am thinking to minor in Chinese. It will take me about 20 credits to do.

I am doing it cause I think it will be useful, but do you think it will look pretty nice on my application?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[vlct0ria]

So, I am thinking to minor in Chinese. It will take me about 20 credits to do.

I am doing it cause I think it will be useful, but do you think it will look pretty nice on my application?

It may help you stand out as someone who can take on a challenge, that is of course if you do well...but honestly, why not learn Spanish if you're looking for something that will be useful? Do you have family members that speak Chinese? Are you planning on working/living in China? I would say those are the kind of questions you need to think about before devoting yourself to a foreign language minor- 20 credits is at least 5 classes and a lot of time/effort/dedication!

 

[DrReo]

A minor is meaningless. Do it because you love it and will use the language, not for any other reason. Same goes for choosing a major...

Exactly.

Unless you have a passion for the language, you'll be better off investing your time in volunteering, research, upper level courses, etc.

 

[iwannabadentist]

This is sorta off topic but...I have a minor but I didn't see any place to put it on the AADSAS application. When you choose your university under coursework it just says Major 1 and Major 2 - so do i just put my minor under the 2nd major?

 

[DrReo]

This is sorta off topic but...I have a minor but I didn't see any place to put it on the AADSAS application. When you choose your university under coursework it just says Major 1 and Major 2 - so do i just put my minor under the 2nd major?

You should not give a minor the credit of a major.

 

[Shingo123]

It may help you stand out as someone who can take on a challenge, that is of course if you do well...but honestly, why not learn Spanish if you're looking for something that will be useful? Do you have family members that speak Chinese? Are you planning on working/living in China? I would say those are the kind of questions you need to think about before devoting yourself to a foreign language minor- 20 credits is at least 5 classes and a lot of time/effort/dedication!

Yeah, unfortunately they don't offer a spanish minor. I don't think a chinese minor would be useless. It is one of the most spoken languages in the world. The primary reason I would be doing it is because I am interested in it.

You are right though, it will be a lot of effort and dedication. So I am not sure I will go through with it. I just think it would be interesting if I would come out with some ability to speak and comprehend Chinese.

I am not sure if that is realistic though.


Anyone have experience in minoring in a language? Where you able to speak a bit when you finished?

Btw: it is 4 five credit classes.


Thanks for the replies.

 

[Omenino]

easy answer....your mom can even answer that question for you....

do what you like...not what other people likes...

So, I am thinking to minor in Chinese. It will take me about 20 credits to do.

I am doing it cause I think it will be useful, but do you think it will look pretty nice on my application?

 

[DrReo]

Yeah, unfortunately they don't offer a spanish minor. I don't think a chinese minor would be useless. It is one of the most spoken languages in the world. Like I said I would be doing it because I am interested in it.

You are right though, it will be a lot of effort and dedication. So I am not sure I will go through with it. I just think it would be interesting if I would come out with some ability to speak and comprehend Chinese.

I am not sure if that is realistic though.


Anyone have experience in minoring in a language? Where you able to speak a bit when you finished?

Btw: it is 4 five credit classes.


Thanks for the replies.

You learn the basics. Nothing beats being on the spot talking with the locals. But to be fluent, you should travel where the language is spoken.

 

[Shingo123]

easy answer....your mom can even answer that question for you....

do what you like...not what other people likes...

You are right. 🙂

I will just have to decide now if it is worth the time and dedication, as it may take away from other volunteering or focus on the upper level science classes. Although I am sure I can manage. 🙂

The last question I have is still: Anyone who might have minored in a language, how much can I expect to learn as far as speaking goes from 4 five credit classes?

They are very intense with 5 day a week recitations.

 

[ddsbruin]

Chinese(mandarin) is VERY useful no matter where you go. it also shows that you're unique and of course bilingual. that's a huge plus and looks good to adcoms. a minor itself isn't necessarily useless. it's another opportunity for you to either learn something you're passionate about or benefit you in the long run. learning any second language is a plus and you'll have an advantage someday when...providing translations is so useful. you're taking part of a health fair in chinatown, travelling to some village in China to provide care, or just communicating with your Chinese colleagues. but as someone in the thread said, learning Chinese from a class can only get you so far...you definitely need to speak and practice on a continual basis with any of your Chinese speaking friends or family (if you're Chinese) in order to retain and improve it. forget about the writing part of Chinese, it's just plain HARD lol. but speaking is definitely a plus. good luck!

 

[Shingo123]

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I think I would love to learn a new language, and that it would be very useful to know Chinese(seeing how many people speak it).

I will check that simplified vs tradition character thing.

I also realize that to really learn a language you have to go to the country and speak with the natives?

However I am wondering from the classes just how much might I learn. Will it open up the door to me being able to learn more on my own, and converse in Chinese.

Btw, I have no previous exposure to Chinese AT all.

Also, I am surprised that Arabic is supposed to be that hard, I can speak some. Reading in Arabic is cake, speaking is not exceptionally hard either.

Once again, thanks for all the good replies!

 

[collinito]

I'm also working on a chinese minor, the community in which I've lived my whole life and hope to work is dominated by chinese presence so my minor i feel won't only be interesting to myself but also useful. My question is however since I don't think I'll be speaking chinese too often in dental school, if I go to dental and don't speak the language often there, will I forget it by the time I get out of dental school? does anyone know about that, it worries me.

 

[Shingo123]

Now I am thinking I may not necessarily do a minor. Just formulate my own language curriculum. So I could do spanish or Japanese if I wanted to.

So that way I choose any language, and not necessarily have to take the "cultural requirements" that plague so many of them.

 

[xtractime]

5 credit language classes are not that difficult, you just have to put in a consistent effort into it. overall, you will probabaly be spending more time on the chinese class than say organic chem...but its easy studying (copying words over and over again). its def not something you can cram for 1-2 days before an exam. but with all the money you will be spending on credits, you could easily buy yourself a plane ticket to china/taiwan and spend a summer there by yourself or in a program. hell you could do it every summer during undergrad and you will pick up chinese MUCH faster that way rather than sitting in class 1 hour a day. colleges in america tend to emphasize writing whereas if you went to asia you would be exposed more to speaking, which in my opinion is much more important.

and since you were asking on a dental thread about how this minor might look to d-schools....tufts MIGHT give it some weight since they are located in boston chinatown. but the chinese here will be speaking cantonese and few will speak mandarin (the adults don't care about mandarin and the kids speak english/canto better than mandarin). they have "asian clinics" certain nights of the week where they will ask the students for translators. you would have to beef up your chinese though since tufts accepts a large majority of chinese, some of whom its their 1st language.

so all in all, like what other people have said in this thread, pick a language to study at your leisure and not to impress dental schools.

 

[somethinpositiv]

and since you were asking on a dental thread about how this minor might look to d-schools....tufts MIGHT give it some weight since they are located in boston chinatown. but the chinese here will be speaking cantonese and few will speak mandarin (the adults don't care about mandarin and the kids speak english/canto better than mandarin). they have "asian clinics" certain nights of the week where they will ask the students for translators. you would have to beef up your chinese though since tufts accepts a large majority of chinese, some of whom its their 1st language.

so all in all, like what other people have said in this thread, pick a language to study at your leisure and not to impress dental schools.

During interviews, I was never asked about my fluency in Mandarin Chinese, nor was I ever asked about my shadowing in China (I shadowed a GP and Prosthodontist in Beijing, a GP in Shanghai). Everyone is required to learn a foreign language in undergrad, I don't think anyone is given additional special consideration because they have a major/minor in a specific language, or are fluent in a foreign language. And as far as Tufts accepting a lot of Chinese, I think it has more to do with the fact that more Chinese (and other Asians) accept their acceptance to Tufts and attend because of cultural reasons, and not because Tufts is accepting more Chinese (and other Asian) applicants relative to other schools. I didn't know about these "Asian Clinics" at Tufts, that's awesome. I also didn't know that Boston Chinatown mostly speaks Canto and not Mandarin, and this is distressing information for me...

 

[DDMess]

I have a minor in Business from a very prestigious business school and I do not believe that minor is useless. I will use it to my advantage as much as I can when applying this cycle. I don't know how much you can use Chinese though. I also took four classes of Spanish as my foreign language requirement in college and I have taken Spanish since middle school.

 

[Tsrshorty]

ok there is really no point in arguing about this because there is no place to put a minor on the AADSAS application, so if you're doing it just to boost your app, it wont. case closed.