单选题When did the story take place?

单选题In the eyes of employees, financial seminars

单选题 The most subversive question about higher education has always been whether the college makes the student or the student makes the college. Along with skepticism, though, economic downturns also create one big countervailing force that pushes people toward college: many of them have nothing better to do. They have lost their jobs, or they find no jobs waiting for them after high school. In economic terms, the opportunity cost of going to school has been reduced. Over the course of the 1930s, the percentage of 17-year-old who graduated from high school jumped to 50 percent, from less than 30 percent. Boys—many of whom would have been working in better times—made up the bulk of the influx. In our Great Recession, students have surged into community colleges. So who is right—these students or the skeptics? It isn't too much of an exaggeration to say that the field of labor economics has spent the past 30 years trying to come up with an answer. In one paper after another, economists have tried to identify the portion of a person's success for which schooling can fairly claim credit. One well-known study, co-researched by Alan Krueger, a Princeton professor now serving as the Treasury Department's chief economist, offered some sup- port for the skeptics. It tracked top high-school students through their 30s and found that their alma maters had little impact on their earnings. Students who got into both, say, the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State made roughly the same amount of money, regardless of which they chose. Just as you might hope, the fine-grain status distinctions that preoccupy elite high-school seniors (and more to the point, their parents) seem to be overrated. The rest of the evidence, however, has tended to point strongly in the other direction. Several studies have found a large earnings gap between more—and less-educated identical twins. Another study compared young men who happened to live close to a college with young men who did not. The two groups were similar except for how easy it was for them to get to school, and the upshot was that the additional education attained by the first group lifted their earnings. "College can't guarantee anybody a good life," says Michael McPherson, an economist who runs the Spencer Foundation in Chicago, which finances education research. "But it surely ups the odds substantially."

单选题 Questions 17-20 are based on the following dialogue. You now have 20 seconds to read Questions 17-20.

单选题Karen Rusa was a 30-year-old woman and the mother of four children. For the past several months Karen had been experiencing repetitive thoughts that centered around her children"s safety. She frequently found herself imagining that a serious accident had occurred; she was unable to put these thoughts out of her mind. On one such occasion she imagined that her son, Alan, had broken his leg playing football at school. There was no reason to believe that an accident had occurred, but she kept thinking about the possibility until she finally called the school to see if Alan was all right. Even after receiving their assurance that he had not been hurt, she described herself as being somewhat surprised when he later arrived home unharmed. Karen also noted that her daily routine was seriously hampered by an extensive series of counting work that she performed throughout each day. Specific numbers had come to have a special meaning to her; she found that her preoccupation with these numbers was hampering her ability to perform everyday activities. One example was grocery shopping. Karen believed that if she selected the first item on the shelf, something terrible would happen to her oldest child. If she selected the second item, some unknown disaster would fall on her second child, and so on for the four children. Karen"s preoccupation with numbers extended to other activities, most notable the pattern in which she smoked cigarettes and drank coffee. If she had one cigarette; she believed that she had to smoke at least four in a row, or one of her children would be harmed in some way. If she drank one cup of coffee, she felt compelled to drink four. Karen acknowledged the unreasonableness of these rules, but, nevertheless, maintained that she felt more comfortable. When she observed them earnestly, when she was occasionally in too great a hurry to observe these rules, she experienced considerable anxiety, in the form of a subjective feeling of dread and fear. She described herself as tense, uneasy, and unable to relax during these periods. The occurrence of rarely minor accidents does not reduce her belief that she had directly responsible because of her inability to observe the rules about number.

单选题As West Nile virus creeps toward California, an unlikely warrior could provide the first line of defense: the chicken. The familiar fowl make irresistible targets for mosquitoes. Unlike crows, chickens don"t get sick from West Nile. But they do produce telltale antibodies to the virus. So in test coops scattered across the state, more than 2000 "sentinel chickens" submit to frequent blood tests. When antibodies do turn up, California health officials will know that the inevitable has occurred: the West Nile epidemic will have swept the country. Last week alone, more than 100 new human cases of West Nile were reported. The virus was detected as far west as Colorado and Wyoming, infecting 371 and killing 16 people in 20 states plus the District of Columbia. This year West Nile appeared earlier in the mosquito season—mid-June instead of August—and claimed younger victims; the average age dropped from 65 to 54. Federal health officials are still trying to figure out why, but say they may be finding more West Nile precisely because they"re on the lookout for it. As Dr. Julie Gerberding, the new director of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), recently told reporters, "We"re not in crisis mode." When West Nile hit New York City in 1999, the CDC realized it was a victim of its own success. Because health officials had conquered most mosquito-borne diseases decades ago, many states abolished their mosquito-control programs. The Feds rushed in with funds—some $ 50 million since 1999, plus $ 31 million more this year alone—to train insect researchers, set up state testing labs and kill off the annoying insects. The CDC established a new computer monitoring system and held strategy sessions with state officials. Some epidemiologists question the focus—and the millions—lavished on a virus that"s killed fewer than 20. "There"s an epidemic in gun violence that"s taking more lives than West Nile virus," says Dr. William Steinmann, director of the Tulance Center for Clinical Effectiveness and Prevention. But the Feds say their efforts have kept West Nile from doing far more damage. "We"re basically building the infrastructure to deal with this over the next 50 years," says Dr. Lyle Peterson, a CDC epidemiologist. "This is here to stay." So far, there are no remedies for West Nile. Officials eventually expect the virus to settle into a quiet pattern of mild infections with occasional outbreaks. To do battle at home, the CDC recommends eliminating standing water and using insect spray with DEET—simple precautions, but the best defense against an invader that shows no signs of going away.

单选题In his research, Glenn Doman discovered that brain-damaged children improved when they

单选题 {{I}} Questions 17--20 are based on the following story about Einstein's life. You now have 20 seconds to read Questions 17--20.{{/I}}

单选题Bacteria are microscopic organisms which live on the surface of objects. They are one of the most ancient living things, which exist on this planet for nearly 4,000 million years. Do you know the size of bacteria? It can only be measured in microns. Maybe you have not a standard in your mind how long a micron is. One micron is a thousandth of a millimeter, which equals about the diameter of a pinhead. Therefore, even if we enlarged the rounded bacterium a thousand times, it would only be the size of a pinhead. We barely see bacteria by a magnification an ordinary microscope of 100 times, even if we try, we cannot make out anything of their structure. There are normally millions of them together, for they can multiply really fast. Scientists have found that some bacteria have attached to wavy-looking "hairs" called flagella. The flagella rotate, pushing the bacteria through the water. Others can glide along over surfaces by some little-understood mechanism. Bacteria are so small that they are influenced by the movements of the chemical molecules around them. They are active all the time. Even the bacteria without flagella often bound about in the water. They are pushed here and there, colliding with the watery molecules. Bacteria cannot be detected because they don"t produce bad odor or change the color or texture of the food. Therefore, when people eat the food with many bacteria, they are likely to get hepatitis A, acute gastroenteritis and a host of other illnesses. Many households have refrigerators to prevent from bacteria. Of course, freezing food slows or stops the growth of bacteria, however, when food is thawed, the bacteria will become reactivated. Bacteria can not be totally destroyed before the food is thoroughly cooked. We need to know that not all bacteria are in connection with illness. Just some bacteria can cause disease. They are called pathogenic bacteria. Fortunately our immune system can protect us from them. Bacteria are prokaryotes (single cells that do not contain a nucleus). It may seem weird to classify organisms according to such details, but with or without a nucleus is not trivial at all. The division between prokaryotes and eukaryotes (all organisms with a nucleus inside their cells) is of extreme importance in biology, and is the result of a major evolutionary breakthrough. Visit our program tomorrow if you want to know more, thank you.

单选题 {{I}}Questions 11-13 are based on the following passage. You now have 15 seconds to read questions 11-13.{{/I}}

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单选题Empowering workers constitutes the first step toward a stronger economy and stronger citizenry. It is a vital step toward overcoming inequality in American society. During the 1980s, the need for better wages for all workers increased as women, traditionally secondary earners, assumed greater responsibility for their own and their children"s well-being. Yet the ability to raise families to a decent living standard through wage work decreased; real wages fell for most workers. And the Federal Government enacted no new policies to facilitate the integration of work and family, as working women and working families suffered a loss in political power as well. Black Or Hispanic women are four times as likely to be low-wage workers as are white men with comparable skills and experience. White women are more than three times as likely as white men to be low-wage workers, and black or Hispanic men more than one-and-a-half times as likely. More than half of all low-wage workers are the only wage workers in their families, or live alone. Employment no longer provides an escape from poverty. More than eight million working adults are poor; two million of them work full-time, year-round. More than seven million poor children have at least one working parent. When that one working parent is a low-wage worker, the children have no better chance of escaping from poverty than if the parent were not working at all; more than two-fifths of such children are poor. Even if generous income assistance were available, the wages employers pay would be held to a minimum. In addition, policies such as tax credits for working parents do nothing to increase the political power of working women and men. Our research shows that unionization is among the most effective strategies for raising pay, especially for women and minority men. Being a union member, or being covered by a collective-bargaining agreement, raised 1984 wages by $ 1.79 per hour for Hispanic men, $ 1.32 for black men, $ 1.26 for Hispanic women, $ 1.01 for black women, $ 0.68 for white women, and $ 0.41 for white men, when all other factors, such as occupation, industry, firm size, education and experience were held constant. In percentage terms, the union increase was more than 15 percent for blacks and Hispanics, 11 percent for white women, and 4 percent for white men.

单选题Howmanyfludeathsayearinthe1990's?A.20,000B.26,000C.30,000D.36,000

单选题The author suggests Dr. Mahathir's comments on the currency problems ______.

单选题 {{I}}Questions 14 -16 are based on the following passage. You now have 15 seconds to read Questions 14 -16.{{/I}}