Set on the southwestern edge of Iceland, Sandgerdi might be the perfect place to raise girls who have mathematical talent. Gover

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问题    Set on the southwestern edge of Iceland, Sandgerdi might be the perfect place to raise girls who have mathematical talent. Government researchers two years ago tested almost every 15-year-old in Iceland for it and found that boys trailed far behind girls. That fact was unique among the 41 countries that participated in the standardized test for that age group designed by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development But while Iceland’s girls were alone in the world in their significant lead in math, their national advantage of 15 points was small compared with the one they had over boys in fishing villages like Sandgerdi, where it was close to 30.
   The teachers of Sandgerdi’s 254 students were only mildly surprised by the result. They say the gender gap is a story not of talent but motivation. Boys think of school as sufferings on the way to a future of finding riches at sea; for girls, it’s their ticket out of town. Margret Ingporsdottir and Hanna Maria Heidarsdottir, both 15, students at Sandgerdi’s gleaming school, have no doubt that they are heading for university. "I think I will be a druggist," says Heidarsdottir. The teens sat in principal Gudjon Kristjansson’s office last week, waiting for a ride to the nearby town of Kevlavik, where they were competing in West Iceland’s yearly math contest, one of many throughout Iceland in which girls excel.
   Meanwhile, by the harbor, Gisli Tor Hauksson, 14, already has big plans that don’t require spending his afternoons toiling over geometry. "I’ll be a fisherman," he says, just like most of his ancestors. His father recently returned home from 60 days at sea off the coast of Norway. "He came back with 1.1 million krona," about $18,000, says Hauksson. As for school, he says, "it destroys the brain." He intends to quit at 16, the earliest age at which he can do so legally.
   But the story of female achievement in Iceland doesn’t necessarily have a happy ending. Educators have found that when girls leave their villages to attend universities in the nation’s cities, their science advantage generally shrinks. While 61% of university students are women, they make up only one-third of Iceland’s science students. By the time they enter the labor market, many are overtaken by men, who become doctors, engineers and computer technicians. Educators say they watch many bright girls suddenly shrink back in the face of real, head-to-head competition with boys. In a math class at a Reykjavik school, Asgeir Gurdmundsson, 17, says that although girls were consistently brighter than boys at school, "they just seem to leave the technical jobs to us." Says Solrun Gensdottir, the director of education at the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, "We have to find a way to stop girls from dropping out of sciences."
   Teachers across the country have begun to experiment with ways to raise boys to the level of girls in elementary and secondary education. The high school in Kevlavik tried an experiment in 2002 and 2003, separating 16-to-20-year-olds by gender for two years. That time the boys slipped even further behind. "The boys said the girls were better anyway," says Krisljan Asmundsson, who taught the 25 boys. "They didn’t even try."
   [A] says that ways must be found to stop girls from dropping out of sciences.
   [B] plans to leave school at the earliest age under which he is legally allowed to do so.
   [C] says the gender gap is not of talent but motivation.
   [D] says that the 25 boys had no intention to work on math because they believed the girls were better than them anyway.
   [E] might be the perfect place for girls who possess talent in math.
   [F] says that school will cause substantial damage to brain.
   [G] says that girls seem to place technical jobs in boys’ hand although they always outperformed boys at school.
Krisljan Asmundsson

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答案D

解析 Kristjan Asmundsson出现在最后一段的最后一句。该句提到负责教25个男生的Kristjan Asmundsson说:“男生说反正女生无论怎样都比他们强,他们连试都不想试。”D项中的had no intention to与原文的they didn’t even try同义,且work on math指明了try的对象,而the girls were better为文中的原词复现,故确定D为答案。
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