Roxy Kalantari

The current French classroom, two years before the program shuts down all together.

With the French program coming to an end at Ayala due to a lack of French enrollment, negative emotions litter the campus. The dissolution of the French class will be especially mourned because, among the other languages, French was one of the more long-standing classes, lasting for about 15 years. 

The coronavirus affected many things including social interactions, the amount of toilet paper in a grocery store, and school.

“During COVID students were unable to recruit each other to the program,” French teacher Mrs. Leigh Anne Munoz said. “Students on virtual were not really talking so much to each other and the numbers dropped.”

The plan for fully ending French is to slowly taper the program out. The class currently taking French 2 will be the last class to take part in the program.

“I feel sad,” junior Nolan Varney said. “I know Mrs. Munoz has been here for a while and that she’s been teaching kids French and other languages for a long time.”

Last year was the last batch of French 1 students, this year includes French 2 classes, and next year will only be French 3 honors and 4 Advanced Placement (AP). Current French 2 students will not have the chance to finish all four years of French and will instead be given the choice of going into French 3 or skipping into French 4AP.

“French is a beautiful language,” English teacher Mrs. Laura Grissom said. “There’s literature in English where it has these great French pronunciations, like  The Tale of Two Cities. It’s sad we’re losing that.”

With French being canceled, the only language classes left to take are Spanish, Mandarin, and American Sign Language (ASL).

Many freshman students, unfortunately, were not given the opportunity to take the French class. 

“[Ayala will have] less diverse language learning…[and the French program] gives more of an option to learn,” freshman Luc Coronado said.

Along with Spanish, ASL, Mandarin, and French, German used to be among the options for language classes. A German couple taught the class before the program ended about twelve to thirteen years ago. The loss of  language classes at Ayala has produced worry concerning a lack of diversity among languages.

“I think there are still plenty of choices, but it seems like the further we go, the more that we lose variety,” Grissom said. 

Other schools in the Chino Valley Unified School District (CVUSD) such as Chino Hills High School and Chino High School teach French (among other languages), so losing the class will put Ayala behind them in class options. Other than Mandarin, French, and Spanish, Chino Hills High also teaches Japanese. 

Although the French program is being closed, there may be hope that it will open back up if enrollment rises.

“Of course, it’s very sad for me. I love the French program, and I love the students,” Munoz said. “I think that the students of Ayala will be missing out on a really lovely language and culture.”