It's official: Santa Barbara High School will replace its German course this fall with Mandarin Chinese.

The change, a proposal-turned-reality by the popularity of the one language over the other during class signups, has angered those who say German’s abrupt termination undermines pupils who need another year of it to boost their college prospects.                           (Click here for Quick Facts)

School officials say they are simply letting the free market reign. Thirty-five students signed up for Mandarin, and only 15 wanted German, Assistant Superintendent Jan Zettel said.

The changes have triggered a broader debate about the merits of offering more complex languages over easier-to-handle languages of Europe.

Some educators fear that, in addition to being too difficult for most high schoolers, Mandarin and Arabic classes could be a passing fad. 

Isabel Downs, an A.P. French teacher at Santa Barbara High School, said the push to teach Mandarin reminds her of the post-Sputnik years, when high schools across the country began the ill-fated trend of offering Russian; or the 1980s and early 90s, when high schools dabbled for a while in offering Japanese.

“I think this is, in a sense, a bandwagon,” she said, adding that she has nothing against the study of Arabic and Chinese. Her son, after all, was an Arabic major in college. “I think it is foolish to replace (more traditional languages) with something that is perhaps just a flash in the pan.”

Maybe so, said Zettel. Or perhaps Latin is yesterday's news, he said.

“Where do they speak Latin anymore?” he said. “You don’t see many ancient Romans wandering around.”

Zettel said he believes that the times are a-changin', and the schools should follow suit.

“In China there are more students classified as being eligible for GATE (Gifted and Talented) than there are students in the whole United States,” he said. “If we all really learned what is going on in the world economy, I think we’d all be taking Chinese right now.”

Among those alarmed by the changes are some UCSB professors.

“UCSB has a very thriving German program,” said Elisabeth Weber, chair of the Department of Germanic, Slavic and Semitic Languages at UCSB. “It’s a shame that in our city – where German is thriving at UCSB and City College – German would be cut at the high school."

At Santa Barbara High, about 15 students need one more year of German to satisfy the foreign-language requirements of some colleges. Those students can complete their credits at Santa Barbara City College.

But Jaimee Hager, who next year will be a senior at Santa Barbara High, said students involved in after-school activities might not have the time.

“Class is from 5 to 7, but if you have school until 4:30 it’s a lot to do in one day for a 16-year-old,” she said.

Jaimee said she wishes the termination of German hadn't "come out of the blue" a year before she fulfilled her requirement.

“A lot of colleges – especially the UC’s – either require or strongly recommend three years of a language instead of two,” she said. “I’ll be low on the list to getting into certain colleges."

Meanwhile, the Mandarin teacher, Sufen Yen, is excited. Yen is a City College instructor, and the class will be what is known as a dual-enrollment course, meaning students who take it will receive City College credit. It will be offered after school twice a week.

“It’s an interesting language that can stimulate the right side of the brain,” she said. “I think it’s also good to prepare this next generation to be citizens of the global village.”