I can remember being a little girl and telling my mom that I was going to take Italian when I got into high school. Of course, that was back when I was five and thought high schools offered a class for everything.

Unfortunately, because I lived in a rural school district where sports take precedence over academics, I had to settle for Spanish. Now, Spanish would have been very beneficial to me — if I actually knew how to speak it. Despite taking three years of good old español, I can’t remember anything outside of, “¡Hola! Me llamo Emily. ¿Como estas?”

In all honesty, taking a foreign language in high school was a complete waste of time and money. And that’s sad because there is nothing I love more than learning new things. But, everybody constantly told us, “It’s better to take it now because it will be harder in college.”

Wait a minute. Isn’t everything harder in college? What makes foreign languages so different from everything else? Why are you making this seem like a chore, an unnecessary evil?

Foreign languages are beautiful and fun. They’re our key to connecting with other people, other cultures outside of our own. Languages should be just as important as math and science and history because they allow us to explore another culture and become more acquainted with the rest of the world.

But sadly, rural school districts across America don’t see it this way because they don’t see the importance of learning another language.

You see, rural areas lack diversity — something that hurts children from rural areas when they go off to college where they’re now just hit in the face with diversity. Many people from rural areas can’t see outside the little bubble they were born in, live in, and will probably die in. And if everyone around you speaks only English, why should you learn another language?

“Besides, this is America. We speak English,” people commonly say.

America is not the only country on Earth, and at the end of the day, it’s really no better than any other country. That’s a fact that a lot of Americans have a hard time swallowing.

This world is made up of thousands of different cultures, and Americans themselves come from diverse backgrounds. Cultures are constantly interacting, as they always have since the beginning of humanity.

Foreign languages are what enables us to interact with those other cultures. They allow us to appreciate and understand other cultures. And language is what unites us as people.

On top of that, it is generally agreed that people who speak more than one language generally have better critical thinking skills than those who don’t.

The United States is one of the few countries in the developed world that doesn’t see learning a foreign language as important as learning complex math skills and studying natural sciences. But that needs to change if the U.S. wants more well-rounded people who are capable of surviving and working in a world where interactions between cultures are becoming the norm.

And, having finally accomplished my goal of learning Italian, I can tell you that learning a language in college is possible. It’s not easy, but neither is any other aspect of college.

Speaking a foreign language is an invaluable skill that opens the door to so many possibilities. I just wish that more Americans understood that.