I'm in the 11th grade at a local Gymnasium (college preparatory high school). That means that I only have two more years- and lots of tests!- before I earn my Abitur, the diploma that allows me to go on to study at a university here in Germany.

The 11th grade is the first year of the Oberstufe, the name for the 11th and 12th grade of Gymnasium. My Gymnasium allows me to concentrate on languages and humanities courses. Friends of mine are at Gymnasiums that let students concentrate more on science and technology. Since I love learning foreign languages, history and geography, I'm at a Gymnasium that lets me concentrate those subjects as my main areas of study.

Here is my weekly schedule:

As you can see from my schedule above, I have a full schedule of classes. I've chosen English and Geography as my major subjects, also called Leistungskurse. The minor subjects are known as Grundkurse. For me those are Spanish, Ethics, History, Biology and Art. I'm required to continue with Math, German and also complete another couple of semesters of Physical Education. Spanish will be my third foreign language. I started with English and then added Latin for a number of years. This year I've traded Latin for Spanish.