Muncie Schools Cuts French From Curriculum

Muncie Community Schools will no longer offer the French language to high school students after this year.  As IPR’s Stephanie Wiechmann reports, students didn’t show interest in the program.

Officials at Muncie Community Schools say they used to be proud of being able to offer five languages to students – Spanish, French, German, Latin, and Japanese.  German was phased out several years ago because of lack of interest.  Now, says Director of Secondary Education Cassandra Shipp, this is French’s last semester.

“Looking at how kids were enrolling into those courses, our World Language was one of those programs that started to be decreased.  So, as students take more Spanish, we don’t have any students continuing in French.  We’re officially removing it from our curriculum.”

Latin is taught as the only dual-credit class the district has that’s taught by Ball State University.

As for other languages, Shipp says that will depend on student interest.  She says the district did consider Chinese for the dual language immersion program offered at West View Elementary to students beginning in kindergarten.  The project ultimately began by teaching Spanish.