Uni Maths Optional Module Choice

So I am choosing my optional module for mathematics at Durham first year and am torn between a Spanish module or a discrete maths module. The Spanish module would get me from GCSE level to AS level. I would like to know is discrete maths worth doing? Is it very applicable in higher level maths or programming for example? Or would it be more useful to further a language?

Yes, discrete maths is very much applicable in higher level maths.

In fact, it is fundamental in programming because it covers is the study of graphs and networks.

Really depends what you mean by "fundamental in programming". I've written code for computer graphics products for over 20 years, and I'd say very few of my colleagues have had had significant formal discrete maths training. (Personally the closest university courses would have been graph theory and optimization and I don't think I've used anything from those courses in my computing career). Good programmers may well end up with "working knowledge" of quite a few things covered in discrete maths, but the approach/emphasis is quite different.

Really depends what you mean by "fundamental in programming". I've written code for computer graphics products for over 20 years, and I'd say very few of my colleagues have had had significant formal discrete maths training. (Personally the closest university courses would have been graph theory and optimization and I don't think I've used anything from those courses in my computing career). Good programmers may well end up with "working knowledge" of quite a few things covered in discrete maths, but the approach/emphasis is quite different.

Conversely, the company I work for was (pre-Covid) running an out-of-hours Spanish class for people wanting an extra language.

Having had a look at the Durham Discrete Maths description, I'd say that it looks like it would be interesting, with a lot of fun topics, but I doubt it's enormously relevant to programming.

That said, I think I'd choose it over Spanish here; the deciding factor being that it will be *much* easier to learn AS level Spanish post-university than it will to learn degree-level mathematics.