Bill Gates, the billionaire Microsoft chairman without a single earned university degree, is by his success raising new doubts about the worth of the business world' s favorite academic title: the MBA(Master of Business Administration).
The MBA, a 20th century product, always has borne the mark of lowly commerce and greed on the tree-lined campuses ruled by purer disciplines such as philosophy and literature.
But even with the recession apparently cutting into the hiring of business school graduates, about 79,000 people were expected to receive MBAs in 1993. This is nearly 16 times the number of business graduates in 1960, a testimony to the widespread assumption that the MBA is vital for young men and women who want to run companies some day.
" If you are going into the corporate world it is still a disadvantage not to have one, " said Donald Morrison, professor of marketing and management science. "But in the last five years or so, when someone asks, ' Should I attempt to get an MBA?' The answer a lot more is: ' It depends. ' "
The success of Bill Gates and other non-MBAs, such as the late Sam Walton of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. , has helped inspire self-conscious debates on business school campuses over the worth of a business degree and whether management skills can be taught.
The Harvard Business Review printed a lively, fictional exchange of letters to dramatize complaints about business degree holders. The article called MBA hires "extremely disappointing" and said " MB As want to move up too fast, they don' t understand politics and people, and they aren' t able to function as part of a team until their third year. But by then, they' re out looking for other jobs. "
The problem, most participants in the debate acknowledge, is that the MBA has acquired an image of future riches and power far beyond its actual importance and usefulness.
Enrollment in business schools exploded in the 1970s and 1980s and created the assumption that no one who pursued a business career could do without one. The growth was fueled by a drive against the anti-business values of the 1960s and by the women' s movement.
Business people who have hired or worked with MB As say those with the degrees often know how to analyze systems but are not so skillful at motivating people. " They don' t get a lot of grounding in the people side of the business", said James Shaffer, vice-president and principal of the Towers Perrin Management Consulting Firm.
单选题 According to Paragraph 2, what is the general attitude towards business on campuses dominated by purer disciplines?
【正确答案】 A
【答案解析】第二段中“lowly commerce”和“greed”有明显的轻视意味。A项意为“轻蔑的”，B项意为“赞赏的”，C项意为“嫉妒的”，D项意为“现实的”。
单选题 It seems that the controversy over the value of MBA degrees had been fueled mainly by______.
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】第一段提到“亿万富翁和微软主席比尔·盖茨，没有任何大学学历，通过其成功引起人们对商界所喜爱的MBA学术头衔的价值的新的怀疑”，第五段更明确地指出“比尔·盖茨及其他非MBA人士的成功，激起了人们对商校学位价值的自省式的争论”，恰和B项吻合。
单选题 What is the major weakness of MBA holders according to the Harvard Business Review?
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】第六段谈到“MBA人想很快提升，他们不懂政治，不懂人事，他们直到3年后才能与集体协作，可那时，他们已转向其他工作了”，即“MBA人不善于处理人际关系”。A项有可能是“不善于处理人际关系”的原因，但原文没有明确提出，因而不选，而B、C两项文中未提及，因而也不选。
单选题 From the passage we know that most MB As______.
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】此题最好用排除法，文中均未提过ABC三项的说法，而D项则在第七段可找到相似说法。“The problem…is that the MBAhas acquired an image of future riches and power far beyond its actualimportance and usefulness”，即“问题在于…MBA已被套上了一圈光环，其对未来权力及富裕的期望远远超出了它自身实际的重要性和用途。”
单选题 What is the passage mainly about?
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】A项“为什么MBA项目要招生”，是无关项。B项“改革MBA项目的必要性”，说得过于肯定，文中意见尚未到达论证“必须改革”的地步。D项“在大学校园上展开的一场辩论”，说得过于泛泛。文章从头至尾围绕一个主题“doubts or debates over the worth ofMBA”。