(Consultants on average earn about a third less than people in similar jobs at companies, according to the IRS, but they pay both the employer and employee shares of Social Security and Medicare—a total of 15% of their income.),排除C项。所以选D。 59. What feasible proposal does the author put forward in this passage? A) Reenact the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 and amend the Federal labor Law. √
B) Grant the self-employed unemployment insurance and workman's compensation.
C) Lower the individual income tax of the self-employed throughout the USA.
D) Rethink the business tax for the self-employed when they're just getting started. 答案:A 解析:本题是:作者提出哪些可行建议?根据文章第四段的内容,可以总结出他的两条建议,国会要重新制定《小型企业职业法案(2010)》(Congress should reenact the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010),并且要修订联邦劳工法(Then let’s amend Federal labor Law)。所以选A。 60. What's the best title for this passage? A) Self-employed Tax and National Insurance. B) The Self-employed VS the Fully-employed.
C) To Boost the Economy, Help the Self-Employed. √ D) Freelancer's Business, the Future of Global Economy.
答案:C 解析:根据文章内容,作者主要是谈到了自由职业者对美国经济的贡献以及他们遭受的发展限制和政府应采取的应对措施。对比四个选项后,选项A和B为以偏概全。选项D提到全球经济,但本文章只提及美国经济。所以选C。 文章大意: 本文提出“学生成绩是否是评价教师教学水平的因素之一”这样一个问题。目前,美国的教师协会对现有的一些以学习成绩来评价教师教学水平的规定并不满意,教育专家们也认为学生成绩并不能很好的反映出大部分称职教师的教学水平。因此,为了准确判定教师的教学水平,需要采取更加实用、更加可行的评价途径。 Smaller schools? More charters? Those are yesterday's headlines in the world of school reform. The hot-button topic now is the inclusion of student test scores in teacher evaluations. Yet as school administrators and the teachers union battle it out in current contract negotiations in Los Angeles, who would have guessed that state law addressed this issue long ago?
A lawsuit filed by a group of parents, aided by the reform group EdVoice, claims that the Los Angeles Unified School District must include standardized test scores or some other measure of student progress to comply with the 40-year-old Stull Act. Though filed only against the district, the suit has statewide implications.
The Stull Act mainly concerned itself with the appeals process for teachers who had been fired. But it included some common-sense language about teacher evaluations, instructing school districts to make student progress one of many factors in teachers' performance reviews. In 1999, specifics were added to the law, requiring teacher evaluations to measure that progress in part through state-approved assessments.
The law's wording is reasonable and clear. Yet school districts have ignored even its oldest and most basic provisions. Even teachers unions complain that their performance reviews have been a joke for years, with almost every review granting the highest rating and few teachers receiving valuable suggestions for improvement.
Test scores—not the raw scores but measurements of how many students improved each year with specific teachers—are one obvious way to add student assessments to teacher evaluations. But the law doesn't prescribe how progress has to be measured, and neither does EdVoice. Graduation rates could count. So could portfolios of student work, if the state could come up with approved ways of using them to gauge progress.
We share union concerns about overreliance on student test scores in teacher performance reviews. According to education experts, the tests are useful only for measuring the top 10% and bottom 10% of teachers, and tell little about the vast majority in between. Still, they could be used as a starting point, to provide training for the most underperforming teachers and to figure out how the most effective teachers are succeeding.
By refusing to entertain the notion that student progress—or lack of it—might have any connection with teacher's effectiveness, unions are missing a chance to shape the way these assessments are used to evaluate teachers. If unions won't work with school districts on reasonable, meaningful changes, they can expect more lawsuits that seek to do it for them.
61. Why is the 40-year-old Stull Act mentioned in this passage? A) Some state-approved assessments were accepted by school districts.
B) Some common-sense rules about teacher evaluations were added in 1999.
C) It included student process as one way to grade teachers' performance. √ D) It mainly concerned itself with the appeal process for those fired teachers. 答案:C 解析:根据题干的关键词40-year-old Stull Act,回文章找出处。在第二段第一句中指出“洛杉矶联合学区必须将标准测试成绩或别的学生进步考量措施纳入对教师的评价中,以符合这一法案”(the Los Angeles Unified School District must include standardized test scores or some other measure of student progress to comply with the 40-year-old Stull Act)。所以选C。 62. Even teacher unions are dissatisfied with the Stull Act in that ________. A) it has been playing jokes on language teachers for many years B) school districts have attached too much importance to the Stull Act
C) the Stull Act wording isn't clear enough for teachers to follow
D) few valuable suggestions were offered to improve teachers' performance √ 答案:D 解析:根据题干关键词teacher unions和are dissatisfied with the Stull Act,回文章找出处。在第四段中可以找到Even teachers unions complain that their performance reviews have been a joke for years, with almost every review granting the highest rating and few teachers receiving valuable suggestions for improvement,所以选D。 63. Obviously, one way to include student assessment into teacher evaluation system is to ________. A) put forward some approved ways for students to assess teachers' teaching
B) compare the graduation rates of specific schools in certain school district
C) measure how much students get improved after being taught by certain teachers for one year √
D) collect the raw scores that students get after being taught by specific teachers for several years 答案:C
解析:根据题干的关键词 Obviously 和 student assessment into teacher evaluation,回文章找出处。在倒数第三段的第一句话中有相关的信息 Test scores—not the raw scores but measurements of how many students improved each year with specific teachers — are one obvious way to add student assessments to teacher evaluation。所以选C。 64. What do education experts say about the practice of evaluating teachers according to their students' test scores? A) It is the most effective way to evaluate teachers. B) It fails to judge the majority of experienced teachers. √
C) It cannot meet the needs of the underperforming teachers.
D) It is of great use to measure the top and bottom teachers. 答案:B 解析:根据题干关键词 education experts,回文章找出处。在倒数第二段中,有教育专家对于这种评价方式的评价,即只对前10%和后10%的教师的评价有用,而反映不出中间大部分的水平(According to education experts, the tests are useful only for measuring the top 10% and bottom 10% of teachers, and tell little about the vast majority in between.)。所以选B。 65. What can we learn from the last paragraph of this passage? A) Some reasonable and meaningful changes are doomed to take place.
B) Some practical and acceptable means are needed to appraise teachers. √
C) Teacher unions should obey all the rules and regulations of school districts.
D) Teacher unions should accept student assessment as one way to judge teachers. 答案:B
解析:根据题干提示,仔细阅读最后一段。并且对比四个选项。选项C和D比较容易排除,在选项A和B之间,选择B。因为文中说道:如果教师协会已经错失一些评价教师教学水平的方法,并且如果教师协会不能与学区主管部门合作,将会导致较多的诉讼。所以选B。
Part IV Translation
Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to translate a passage from Chinese into English. 1. 18世纪后半叶,法国曾经出现过一种叫做“法兰西灯影”的戏剧形式,在巴黎、马赛等地演出,一时引起轰动。那是传教士将中国的皮影戏介绍到法国后,法国戏剧家在皮影戏的基础上创造出来的艺术形式。在世界历史上,要说中国文化对世界的影响,皮影戏是不可忽视的。这种创自中国的戏剧形式,在13世纪就传到了中东,到了18世纪便有了世界性的影响。 答案: In the latter half of the 18th century, a form of drama arose in France called “French Light and Shadow”, which caused a great sensation when it was staged in Paris and Marseilles. The shadow play is an indigenous form of drama in China. In the 13th century it was introduced into the Middle East, and by the 18th century it had spread to other parts of the world.