D. family labor is often adequately rewarded Text 2

For years, studies have found that first-generation college students—those who do not have a parent with a college degree—lag other students on a range of education achievement factors. Their grades are lower and their dropout rates are higher. But since such students are most likely to advance economically if they succeed in higher education, colleges and universities have pushed for decades to recruit more of them. This has created “a paradox” in that recruiting first-generation students, but then watching many of them fail, means that higher education has “continued to reproduce and widen, rather than close” an achievement gap based on social class, according to the depressing beginning of a paper forthcoming in the journal Psychological Science.

But the article is actually quite optimistic, as it outlines a potential solution to this problem, suggesting that an approach (which involves a one-hour, next-to-no-cost program) can close 63 percent of the achievement gap (measured by such factors as grades) between first-generation and other students.

The authors of the paper are from different universities, and their findings are based on a study involving 147 students (who completed the project) at an unnamed private university. First generation was defined as not having a parent with a four-year college degree. Most of the first-generation students (59.1 percent) were recipients of Pell Grants, a federal grant for undergraduates with financial need, while this was true only for 8.6 percent of the students with at least one parent with a four-year degree.

Their thesis—that a relatively modest intervention could have a big impact—was based on the view that first-generation students may be most lacking not in potential but in practical knowledge about how to deal with the issues that face most college students. They cite past research by several authors to show that this is the gap that must be narrowed to close the achievement gap.

Many first-generation students “struggle to navigate the middle-class culture of higher education，learn the ‘rules of the game,’ and take advantage of college resources,” they write. And this becomes more of a problem when colleges don’t talk about the class advantage and disadvantages of different groups of students. “Because US colleges and universities seldom acknowledge how social class can affect students’ educational experience, many first-generation students lack

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insight about why they are struggling and do not understand how students ‘like them’ can improve.”

26. Recruiting more first-generation students has____. A. reduced their dropout rates B. narrowed the achievement gap C. missed its original purpose D. depressed college students 27. The authors of the research article are optimistic because____. A. the problem is solvable B. their approach is costless

C. the recruiting rate has increased D. their finding appeal to students 28. The study suggests that most first-generation students____. A. study at private universities B. are from single-parent families C. are in need of financial support D. have failed their college 29. The authors of the paper believe that first-generation students____. A. are actually indifferent to the achievement gap B. can have a potential influence on other students C. may lack opportunities to apply for research projects D. are inexperienced in handling their issues at college 30. We may infer from the last paragraph that____.

A. universities often reject the culture of the middle-class B. students are usually to blame for their lack of resources C. social class greatly helps enrich educational experiences D. colleges are partly responsible for the problem in question Text 3

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Even in traditional offices, “the lingua franca of corporate America has gotten much more emotional and much more right-brained than it was 20 years ago,” said Harvard Business School professor Nancy Koehn. She started spinning off examples. “If you and I parachuted back to Fortune 500 companies in 1990, we would see much less frequent use of terms like journey, mission, passion. There were goals，there were strategies, there were objectives, but we didn’t talk about energy; we didn’t talk about passion.”

Koehn pointed out that this new era of corporate vocabulary is very “team”-oriented—and not by coincidence. “Let’s not forget sports—in male-dominated corporate America, it’s still a big deal. It’s not explicitly conscious; it’s the idea that I’m a coach, and you’re my team, and we’re in this together. There are lots and lots of CEOs in very different companies, but most think of themselves as coaches and this is their team and they want to win”.

These terms are also intended to infuse work with meaning—and, as Khurana points out，increase allegiance to the firm. “You have the importation of terminology that historically used to be associated with non-profit organizations and religious organizations：Terms like vision, values, passion, and purpose,” said Khurana. This new focus on personal fulfillment can help keep employees motivated amid increasingly loud debates over work-life balance The “mommy wars” of the 1990s are still going on today, prompting arguments about why women still can’t have it all and books like Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In，whose title has become a buzzword in its own right. Terms like unplug, offline, life-hack，bandwidth, and capacity are all about setting boundaries between the office and the home. But if your work is your “passion,” you’ll be more likely to devote yourself to it, even if that means going home for dinner and then working long after the kids are in bed. But this seems to be the irony of office speak: Everyone makes fun of it, but managers love it, companies depend on it, and regular people willingly absorb it. As Nunberg said, “You can get people to think it’s nonsense at the same time that you buy into it.” In a workplace that’s fundamentally indifferent to your life and its meaning, office speak can help you figure out how you relate to your work—and how your work defines who you are.

31. According to Nancy Koehn, office language has become____.

A. more emotional B. more objective C. less strategic D. less energetic

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32. “team”-oriented corporate vocabulary is closely related to____. A. historical incidents B. gender difference C. sports culture D. athletic executives

33. Khurana believes that the importation of terminology aims to____. A. revive historical terms B. promote company image

C. foster corporate cooperation D. strengthen employee loyalty 34. It can be inferred that Lean In____.

A. voices for working women B. appeals to passionate workaholics C. triggers debates among mommies D. praises motivated employees 35. Which of the following statements is true about office speak? A. Managers admire it but avoid it. B. Linguists believe it to be nonsense. C. Companies find it to be fundamental. D. Regular people mock it but accept it. Text 4

Many people talked of the 288,000 new jobs the Labor Department reported for Jure, along with the drop in the unemployment rate to 6.1 percent, as good news. And they were right. For now it appears the economy is creating jobs at a decent pace. We still have a long way to go to get back to full employment, but at least we are now finally moving forward at a faster pace.

However, there is another important part of the jobs picture that was largely overlooked. There was a big jump in the number of people who report voluntarily working part-time. This figure is now 830,000 (4.4 percent) above its year ago level. Before explaining the connection to the Obamacare, it is worth making an important distinction. Many people who work part-time jobs actually want full-time jobs. They take part-time work because this is all they can get. An increase in

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