高三英语任务型阅读专练(一)

(一)

The Internet is making the world smaller and changing every aspect of our lives. The impact of this, in my opinion, will be strongly felt in the field of education. There are three reasons for this.

First, the Internet provides equal opportunities for all students, as long as they can get access to it. In the traditional form of education, students who get higher marks in examines may enter a good school, and those who do not, have to enter a relatively less good one. With the Internet, every student is provided with access to the same educational materials, so they have equal opportunities to improve themselves. In that case, the general quality of education will be highly improved in our country.

Second, the Internet poses a challenge to teachers. Traditionally, teachers have controlled education. With the Internet, a student may choose any teacher’s instruction as he wishes. Faced with this, a teacher is likely to try his best to improve his instruction and this will in turn improve the educational quality of our country. Last but not least, the Internet makes education more convenient for students. A student can learn at any time he likes and, at the same time, he can save the money spent on tuition and board. All of these may lead to a revolution in education.

It is true that the Internet may still remain out of the reach of some people and maybe less amicable than human teachers. But the point is that, the Internet is sure to accelerate the development of education in our country.

（二）

Looking ahead to 2010, it appears, in money matters, impossible to provide 85,000 new students with classrooms at public four-year universities. Fortunately, such an approach is not necessary. In fact, it’s not even proper.

Several forces are riding to the rescue. The two most important are distance learning and community and technical colleges. These will not remove completely the traditional setting where bachelor’s and graduate degrees are earned. But they will be able to handle much of the growth in the number of the students admitted and the demand for higher education.

“When faced with a problem created by technology, bring more technology into operation,” a late reporter declared. High education seems to be an example. New learning technology is a determining tool in teaching new technical skills.

William Richardson, president of Johns Hopkins University, praised “Western Governors’ University” --- a virtual institution that uses the Internet and other information technology to overcome the vast distances of the West and reach people with education. “Just as the extremely controlled high school of old was perfect in training for a production-line work force, so today’s college is equally proper as a setting for a society whose members must a cquire and manage knowledge from a wide variety of sources,” he notes.

Eastern Washington has long been a leader in this movement. For the past decade, Spokane’s Education Service District 101 has brought the best teachers to country classrooms through satellite uplink. Washington State University (WSU) president Sam Smith reports that, during the same period, WSU managed a one-third increase in students with only 2% more faculty (e.g. teachers and workers)

The other cost-effective method is dependence on community and technical colleges. Here, Washington state has an edge. Its public two-year colleges provide the widest coverage in the nation. Jean Floten, president of Bellevue community College, notes the system served 425,000 adult students last year, a tenth of the state’s adult population. Almost half were there for job hunting while 40% for learning preparation.