Graduate Reading Exams in Spanish

(Updated 8/9/2022)

The M.A. foreign language reading requirement can be met in one of two ways:

1) Submit to the Department of World Languages and Cultures an official or unofficial college transcript that shows a 300-level class taken and completed with a C or higher.

2) Take the graduate reading exam.

Contact the exam administrator, Dr. Agustín Pastén, at least three weeks prior to when you would like to schedule your Spanish reading exam. Exams are not given in the summer.

Include the following in your email:

• Academic department and major field of study.
• Specific concentration within your discipline, and area of special interest (e.g. English: American literature, Southern writers).
• Name of graduate advisor
• Student number

The exam consists of a reading passage related to the student’s area of specialization chosen by the exam administrator. 

Students are encouraged to prepare for the exam by reading and practicing translating several articles in their field of study, as well as reviewing a Spanish grammar book such as:

• Resnick, Seymour, William Giuliano, and Phyllis M. Golding. En breve: A Concise Review of Spanish Grammar. 5th ed. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 2002.

There is also a self-guided Moodle space FLS 401 Spanish for Graduate Students that contains practice activities. Email the exam administrator to request access. To get the most out of the Moodle site, the student should have a Spanish grammar textbook such as  En breve, which is available on textbook reserve in the library. A useful online resource for Spanish grammar from the Spanish in Texas Project at the University of Texas-Austin can be found here: http://grammar.spanishintexas.org/site-index/

Students must score at least 65% on the exam to pass. The exam may retaken.

For more information on fulfilling the graduate reading requirement in a foreign language, see http://wlc.chass.ncsu.edu/graduate/certification/

Please email any questions to the exam administrator.