新标准大学英语综合教程4课后答案

综合教程4课后答案

Handouts and Key to book4 unit1-4

Unit 1

Active reading (1)

Looking for a job after university? First, get off the

sofa

Background information

About the passage: This is an article by an Education

Correspondent, Alexandra Blair, published in

September 2008 in The Times, a long-established British

quality newspaper. In Europe generally, and in

Britain in particular, for a number of years there has

been a rising number of students who go to university

and therefore more new graduates seeking employment.

However, for many graduates finding a job became

harder in 2008–2009 because the economic downturn –

then a recession – meant that many employers

werereducing their workforce. After their final exams,

some students rested in the summer before looking for

jobs

and then they found that it was difficult to find employment in their field or at the level they wanted.

The

article addresses the problems of such new graduates

who might be stuck at home and advises their parents

to be there for their children (ie to be available if

their children want to talk about the problem or if they

need help). The article recommends finding work in a

bar or supermarket rather than sitting unemployed

at home since this is more likely to lead to better

employment later. The style is partly of a report, but

also

of a humorous comment for light entertainment (seen in

the jokey language and problem-solving advice to

parents).

Why finding a job in 2008 is so difficult for university

graduates?

Universities in Europe, particularly in Britain, have

expanded greatly in the last fifteen years (over 45%

of

young adults now go on to higher education), so there

are more graduates looking for jobs. This competitive

situation became a lot worse in 2008 onwards with the credit crunch and economic depression, which meant

that there were fewer jobs available and a rise in

unemployment. Thus new graduates have to be active

to seek a job, they need to fill in many application

forms and try to get job interviews: they won’t find

employment by lying on the sofa at home.

Culture points

honours degree: Traditionally, in the British

university system, BA and BSc honours degrees are

awarded

in different categories: a first class degree (written

using Roman numbers as I), a second (divided into two

subcategories, written as IIii and IIii, which are

called “a two one” and “a two two”), a third

(written III) and

a pass degree. Most people get a second. There are also

ordinary degrees with more general courses of study

without these categories.

Generation Y and Grunt: The main idea here is that there

is a succession of different generations or

cohorts of adults who come into the workforce in North

America which are given different informal names to characterize them. First, “Baby boomers” were born

in the great increase (the boom) of births after World

War II (1946–1960), followed by “Generation X”

people (born 1960–1980) who were said to bring new

attitudes of being independent, informal,

entrepreneurial, and expected to get skills and have

a career before

them. “GenerationY” or the “Millenial Generation”

(born 1980s and 1990s and becoming adult in the new

millenium) are now making up an increasing percentage

of the workforce; they are said to be spoilt by doting

parents, to have structured lives, to be used to

teamwork and diverse people in a multicultural society.

In

the passage, this generation is now becoming (morphing

into) Generation Grunt, which is an ironic name

referring to repetitive, low status, routine or

mindless work – this may be the only work available

to some

graduates, who may have to take very ordinary jobs to

get experience before they find something more

suitable. “Grunt” also refers to coarse behaviour or bad manners and to the deep sound that is made by a pig;

when people “grunt” they express disgust but do not

communicate with words – this may be how the parents

of new graduates think their children communicate with

them!

A comprehensive refers to a British type of secondary

school which became popular in the1960s. Before that

there were academic “grammar schools” and more

general “secondary modern” schools for those who did

not pass the grammar school entrance tests, but the

comprehensive schools were designed for all students

in

a social philosophy of bringing diverse students

together whether they were academic or not. Those

students

who went to a comprehensive school probably felt that

had to study particularly hard (I worked my backside

off) to get to university, compared to those who went

to grammar schools where all students were academic