The Advantage of Education of Special Area School in Washington D.C. Coming to Washington, it took time to see the differenc

admin2013-07-08  46

问题            The Advantage of Education of Special Area School in Washington D.C.
    Coming to Washington, it took time to see the difference. As usual, everyone complained about public education. That’s an American pastime. But the more high schools I visited here, the more I realized this was— at least relatively speaking—the Shangri-la of American education. There were more schoois in one place than I had ever seen that fit my profiie-well-mixed, well-run, with families committed to strong instruction. They shrugged off neighbors who, betraying unexamined biases, wondered how they could send their kids to those schools.
    Other parts of the country share some of this good fortune: the San Gabriel Valley, the San Francisco peninsula, Houston, Dallas, Charlotte, Norfolk, much of urban Florida. This is subjective, of course, but I have data that shows the piaces most likely to have both challenging and diverse schools. Greater D.C. leads the list.
    When I returned to iocai education reporting after two decades as a foreign, national and business reporter, I started covering the Arlington and Alexandria schools. I was amazed. Arlington’s three regular high schools, Yorktown, Washington-Lee and Wakefield, and Alexandria’s T. C. Williams were almost exactly what I was looking for. I wandered further and saw there were plenty more like that—to name just a few, Mount Vernon, Stuart, South Lakes and Annandaie in Fairfax County; Bethesda-Chevy Chase, Springbrook, Blake and Gaithersburg in Montgomery County; Wilson, Duke Ellington and Bell (its name since changed to Columbia Heights) in the District. The outer ring of counties—Prince William, Loudoun, Anne Arundel and Charles—were all experiencing demographic shifts, but their schools, surprisingly, got better.
    So many parents and educators here agree on the worthiness of rigorous instruction for as many kids as possible, and on helping children appreciate their differences. The region has some advantages. Issues of national unity are woven into many parents’ working lives. Salaries are relatively high and stable, which means healthy school budgets. Smart school boards recruited wise superintendents, who picked the best principals, who found the most talented teachers, who gave students lessons rich in content and thought.
    I remember asking seniors in a government class at T. C. Williams about the differences between them. The teacher, Jack Esformes, had put in the same class Advan-ced Placement students heading for college and other students praying for the last bell. Weren’t they uncomfortable, all mixed together?
    They fiercely defended their pride at being one exciting class, with contributions from everyone. In their eyes, I was just another clueless visitor trying to stereotype them. I have the data backing up my impressions. But who wants to deal with that on New Year’s Eve?
    So cheek the stats yourself and tell me if I’m not right. By fortunate happenstance, with much work and talk, people of every sort have created schools in this region that have turned that overused word diversity into something real, and given a greater portion of our adolescents a better education than I have seen anywhere else.
What can NOT be inferred from the first paragraph?

选项 A、People in Washington complain about school education as other Americans do.
B、The complaint may not reflect or even cover up the real situation of Washington.
C、The writer does not believe what the Washington people complain about schools.
D、There is hardly any difference between Washington and other states of the US.

答案D

解析 推理判断题。根据题干提示定位到第一段。出该段第一句可知,初到华盛顿的人可能不能马上发现它的与众不同,但这并不等同于华盛顿和别的地方没什么两样,故[D]符合题干要求,为正确选项。由该段可知,华盛顿地区的人和所有美国人一样,喜欢对学校教育指手画脚,这是他们消磨时间的方式,故排除[A];由这种讽刺的语气可以看出,作者对这些人的评沦不以为然,认为没什么价值,不一定反映出当地的真实情况,故[B]、[C]排除。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/2sO4777K
0

随机试题
最新回复(0)