A friend of mine is confused about whether she should go to York or McMaster. She wants to become a spanish and french teacher in high school but does not know about the path she would have to take at McMaster to become one. Thanks.

She can go to any school really. York has a concord program that would allow her to do a teaching degree alongside her undergrad, however her undergrad would be 5 years long if she chose to do an honours program. Either way she's looking at the same amount of time.

She should focus on the programs that each school offers. I don't know about the Spanish here at Mac but I do know that the French Dept isn't the greatest, it's small and like most humanities dept's it's not very well funded. If she's looking to go into languages I would suggest Yorks Glendon Campus over going to Mac, Glendon is well known for its languages.

From my understanding to teach in Highschool you just need an honours B.A with the requisite number of units per teachable (varies per teacher's college) and a B.Ed (earned at teacher's college)

Unfortunately I don't think students are able to major in Spanish anymore, your friend would likely have to major in French with a minor in Spanish. Mac cut back most of the modern language departments massively (including my own department, German). Some teacher's colleges also discourage majoring in two languages and prefer candidates who have varied teachables, but it all depends on the institution.

So yeah, as long as your friend earns the requisite amount of units per subject in their degree they qualify as teachables.

Yes, I think last year (2007-2008) was the last year a student could major in Spanish. You are now only permitted to minor in it.

So lame, so lame. LANGUAGES ARE REALLY IMPORTANT!!!!