If you studied Russian at high school, you may be "placed" in a 2200- or 3300-level course in our Russian Language Program. Come to the Placement Test (also called CASE--Cornell Advanced Standing Examination) that we administer a few days before the beginning of each semester. The time and place for this test are posted for a few weeks before each new semester at our home page. The test is informal and is not designed to evaluate your knowledge of any specific points of Russian grammar or vocabulary. Instead, it is intended to find an appropriate Russian language course for you, that is to "place" you in our course structure. There are no numerical qualifications for this process. Every high school Russian program is different. We've had many students with three to five years of high school study start in our Russian 2203, but other options also exist.

Foreign Language requirement at Cornell's College of Arts and Sciences changed in the summer of 2003. According to the new policy, stated in the April 30, 2003 document entitled Advanced Placement Credit from the Educational Policy Committee, advanced placement credit may not be used to exempt students from distribution, language, or breadth requirements (section Policies). The same document states that students will continue to earn advanced placement credit in foreign languages if they are placed out of (not into) the first course at Cornell's 2200-level (section "Foreign Languages"). If you're qualified to start your Cornell Russian studies in our Russian 2204, you receive 3 credit hours/units towards graduation.

Students who transfer from other colleges, where they studied Russian, should speak to our faculty regarding the transfer of credit and the fulfillment of the Arts College foreign language requirement.