2. 考研
  3. The Republican presidential candidateRick Santorum recently set off a debate when he attacked America’s colleges as "indoctrinat

The Republican presidential candidateRick Santorum recently set off a debate when he attacked America’s colleges as "indoctrinat

admin2013-06-26  75
问题     The Republican presidential candidateRick Santorum recently set off a debate when he attacked America’s colleges as "indoctrination mills" from which Americans should keep their distance. Calling President Obama a " snob" for urging all Americans to go to college, he joined a long tradition that runs from Andrew Carnegie, who more than a century ago described colleges as places that prepare students for "life upon another planet," to Newt Gingrich, who has claimed that alumni donations are often used "to subsidize bizarre and destructive visions of reality. "
    Mr. Santorum’s remarks have been widely, and justly,rebutted. Yet defenders of college should do more than respond to its critics with contempt. We should seize the opportunity for introspection. Why does the anti-college mantra still touch a nerve among so many Americans?
    Consider the fact that SAT scores (a big factor in college admissions) correlate closely with family wealth. The total average SAT score of students from families earning more than $ 100,000 per year is more than 100 points higher than for students in the income range of $ 50,000 to $ 60,000. Or consider that a mere 3 percent of students in the top 150 colleges come from families in the bottom income quartile of American society. Only a very dogmatic Social Darwinist would conclude from these facts that intelligence closely tracks how much money one’s parents make. A better explanation is that students from affluent families have many advantages—test-prep tutors, high schools with good college counseling, parents with college savvy and so on.
    Yet once the beneficiaries arrive at college, what do they learn about themselves? It’s a good bet that the dean or president will greet them with congratulations for being the best and brightest ever to walk through the gates. A few years ago, the critic and essayist William Deresiewicz, who went to Columbia and taught at Yale, wrote that his Ivy education taught him to believe that those who didn’t attend " an Ivy League or equivalent school" were " beneath" him.
    Our oldest and most prestigious colleges are losing touch with the spirit in which they were founded. To the stringent Protestants who founded Harvard, Yale and Princeton, the mark of salvation was not high self-esteem but humbling awareness of one’s lowliness in the eyes of God. With such awareness came the recognition that those whom God favors are granted grace not for any worthiness of their own, but by God’s umnerited mercy—as a gift to be converted into working and living on behalf of others. That lesson should always be part of the curriculum.
    Benjamin Franklin, who founded theUniversity of Pennsylvania, once defined true education as "an Inclination join’d with an Ability to serve Mankind, one’s Country, Friends, and Family; which Ability... should indeed be the great Aim and End of all Learning. " We would be well served to keep this public-spirited conception of learning squarely in mind.
    Perhaps if our leading colleges encouraged more humility and less hubris, college-bashing would go out of style and we could get on with the urgent business of providing the best education for as many Americans as possible.
The author’s attitude toward Santorum’s outcry is______.
选项 A、reserved consent
B、slight contempt
C、harsh criticism
D、full support
答案A
解析 作者在第一段就引入了圣多伦的观点。他把现在的大学称为“填鸭工厂”。作者当然对这样的说法不能苟同，但是作者又认为美国大学教育确实存在问题，因此他对于圣多伦的公开言论持部分肯定的态度。[A]答案正确。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/pOd4777K
0

考研英语一

相关试题推荐
随机试题
最新回复(0)