Latin will no longer be offered next year at South Lakes. Removing this class will impact both Latin students and the new Latin teacher, leaving South Lakes students with less language choices.
Students are drawn to taking Latin for a number of reasons, one being that the approach to teaching and learning is different compared to modern alternatives being taught at South Lakes. Students must focus more on grammar and spelling rather than speaking. The language opens up opportunities for students that other, more traditional languages could not. “It applies to other subjects. In science, it’s helpful to know the Latin roots of words,” said Ms. Koshute, the current Latin teacher.
Taking Latin gives students a sense of uniqueness as it becomes more and more obsolete. Latin skills may also give students an advantage when it comes to SAT testing. According to a study done by the educational testing service, titled “The Latin Advantage”, they, on average, have higher reading SAT scores compared to students who take other languages like French or German.
Removing Latin takes away some of the freedom students have when picking a language to take. “I think it’s important, just for the simple fact of giving people an option,” said Joey Rosales-Menendaz, a Latin student. Still, many languages, including French, Spanish, German and Japanese are offered to students.
Students taking Latin now have to choose what language they will take next year. Those who have only taken Latin in school will now have to pick a new language, starting from the beginning at the lowest level, which may cause some frustration.
The current South Lakes Latin teacher, Ms. Koshute, is not only new to South Lakes but also new to teaching her own class, meaning she has only had one school year to break into teaching.“I did know going in that I’d probably only be here for a year, so I am trying to make the most of it,” added Ms. Kotshute.
Cutting Latin from the class list, whether popular or not, will impact those taking the language as well as those who would want to as well. With no more Latin, the choices for language classes start to narrow.
