Part I Writing (30 minutes)
Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write a composition on the topic “Talent Is More than a Certificate”. You should write at least 120 words following the outline given below in Chinese:
1. 目前社会上有一种重文凭轻能力的现象，譬如公司在聘用人才时……
2. 然而……
3. 你的观点是……
Part II Reading Comprehension (Skimming and Scanning) (15 minutes)
Directions: In this part, you will have 15 minutes to go over the passage quickly. For questions 1-7, choose the best answer from the four choices marked A), B), C) and D). For questions 8-10, complete the sentences with the information given in the passage.
Secrets of Self-Made Millionaires
They’re just like you. But with lots of money.
When you think of “millionaire”, what image comes to your mind? For many of us, it’s a flashy Wall Street banker type who flies a private jet, collects cars and lives the kind of decadent lifestyle that would make Donald Trump proud.
But many modern millionaires live in middle-class neighborhoods, work full-time and shop in discount stores like the rest of us. What motivates them isn’t material possessions but the choices that money can bring. “For the rich, it’s not about getting more stuff. It’s about having the freedom to make almost any decision you want,” says T. Harv Eker, author of Secrets of the Millionaire Mind. Wealth means you can send your child to any school or quit a job you don’t like.
According to the Spectrem Wealth Study, an annual survey of America’s wealthy, there are more people living the good life than ever before — the number of millionaires nearly doubled in the last decade. And the rich are getting richer. To make it onto the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans, a mere billionaire no longer makes the cut. This year you needed a net worth of at least $1.3 billion.
If more people are getting richer than ever, why shouldn’t you be one of them? Here are the secrets revealed by the people who have at least a million dollars in liquid assets.
.1. Set your sights on where you’re going
Twenty years ago, Jeff Harris hardly seemed on the road to wealth. He was a college dropout who struggled to support his wife, DeAnn, and three kids, working as a grocery store clerk and at a junkyard where he melted scrap metal alongside convicts (囚犯). “At times we were so broke that we washed our clothes in the bathtub because we couldn’t afford the Laundromat.” Now he’s a 49-year-old investment advisor and multimillionaire in York, South Carolina.
There was one big reason Jeff pulled ahead of the pack: He always knew he’d be rich. The reality is that 80 percent of Americans worth at least $5 million grew up in middle-class or lesser households, just like Jeff.
Wanting to be wealthy is a crucial first step. Eker says, “The biggest obstacle to wealth is fear. People are afraid to think big, but if you think small, you’ll only achieve small things.”
It all started for Jeff when he met a stockbroker at a Christmas party. “Talking to him, it felt like discovering fire,” he says. “I started reading books about investing during my breaks at the grocery store, and I began putting $25 a month in a mutual fund.” Next he taught a class at a local community college on investing. His students became his first clients, which led to his investment practice. “There were lots of struggles,” says Jeff, “but what got me through it was believing with all my heart that I would succeed.”
2. Educate yourself
When Steve Maxwell graduated from college, he had an engineering degree and a high-tech job — but he couldn’t balance his checkbook. “I took one finance class in college but dropped it to go on a ski trip,” says the 45-year-old father of three, who lives in Windsor, Colorado. “I actually had to go to my bank and ask them to teach me how to read my statement (结算单).”
One of the biggest obstacles to making money is not understanding it: Thousands of us avoid investing because we just don’t get it. But to make money, you must be financially literate. “It bothered me that I didn’t understand this stuff,” says Steve, “so I read books and magazines about money management and investing, and I asked every financial whiz (高手) I knew to explain things to me.”
.He and his wife started applying the lessons: They made a point to live below their means. They never bought on impulse, always negotiated better deals (on their cars, cable bills, furniture) and stayed in their home long after they could afford a more expensive one. They also put 20 percent of their annual salary into investments.
Within ten years, they were millionaires, and people were coming to Steve for advice. “Someone would say, ‘I need to refinance my house — what should I do?’ A lot of times, I wouldn’t know the answer, but I’d go find it and learn something in the process,” he says.
In 2003, Steve quit his job to become part owner of a company that holds personal finance seminars for employees of corporations like Wal-Mart. He also started going to real estate investment seminars, and it’s paid off: He now owns $30 million worth of investment properties, including apartment complexes, a shopping mall and a quarry.
“I was an engineer who never thought this life was possible, but all it truly takes is a little self-education,” says Steve. “You can do anything once you understand the basics.”
3. Passion pays off
In 1995, Jill Blashack Strahan and her husband were barely making ends meet. Like so many of us, Jill was eager to discover her purpose, so she splurged on a session with a life coach. “When I told her my goal was to make $30,000 a year, she said I was setting the bar too low. I needed to focus on my passion, not on the paycheck.”
Jill, who lives with her son in Alexandria, Minnesota, owned a gift basket company and earned just $15,000 a year. She noticed when she let potential buyers taste the food items, the baskets sold like crazy. Jill thought, Why not sell the food directly to customers in a fun setting?
With $6,000 in savings, a bank loan and a friend’s investment, Jill started packaging gourmet foods in a backyard shed and selling them at taste-testing parties. It wasn’t easy. “I remember sitting outside one day, thinking we were three months behind on our house payment, I had two employees I couldn’t pay, and I ought to get a real job. But then I thought, No, this is your dream. Recommit and get to work.”
She stuck with it, even after her husband died three years later. “I live by the law of abundance, meaning that even when there are challenges in life, I look for the win-win,” she says.
.The positive attitude worked: Jill’s backyard company, Tastefully Simple, is now a direct-sales business, with $120 million in sales last year. And Jill was named one of the top 25 female business owners in North America by Fast Company magazine.
According to research by Thomas J. Stanley, author of The Millionaire Mind, over 80 percent of millionaires say they never would have been successful if their vocation wasn’t something they cared about.
1. How does the passage portray modern millionaires?
A) People who fly private planes. B) People who have the freedom to make any decision.
C) People who do part-time jobs. D) People who lead rotten lives.
2. How much net worth is needed if you want to be one of the richest Americans, according to the Forbes?
A) $5 million. B) $30 million. C) $120 million. D) $1.3 billion.
3. How old was Jeff Harris when he was so poverty-stricken that he could barely support his family?
A) 45. B) 29. C) 35. D) 49.
4. What should people do to make big money, according to Steve Maxwell?
A) Live below their means. B) Buy on impulse.
C) Read books and magazines about finance. D) Negotiate better deals.
5. Jill Blashack Strahan’s success in business is mostly due to her _________.
A) willingness to think big B) financial literacy
C) positive attitude D) material possessions
6. What made Jill Blashack Strahan one of the top 25 businesswomen in North America?
A) She sold super foods directly to customers. B) She made up an annual income goal.
C) She got a big loan from the bank. D) She got a real job.
.7. Which of the following is NOT a way to become a millionaire?
A) Setting big goals. B) Studying by yourself.
C) Being passionate. D) Sharing success stories.
8. According to Eker, the biggest barrier for people to be wealthy is ________.
9. The study done by Thomas J. Stanley shows that more than 80% of millionaires say their success are due to ___________.
10. The author gave us ___________ people’s secrets of becoming a millionaire in the passage.
Part III Reading Comprehension (Reading in Depth) (25 minutes)
■ Section A
Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.
Questions 11 to 20 are based on the following passage.
U.S. fourth- and eighth-graders improved their math scores in a closely watched international test, but continued to lag well behind peers from top-performing Asian countries.
The U.S. and other governments on Tuesday 11 the results of the test, Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, the world’s largest assessment of international achievement. Some 425,000 students in almost 60 countries took the exam, administered every four years, starting in 1995.
The test results come as businesses have warned that poor performance in math is eroding U.S. 12 , and as lawmakers in Washington prepare for a key battle over education policy.
U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings and some experts said the 13 suggest a victory for tougher teaching standards, increased rigor in math instruction, and the frequent standardized testing 14 by President Bush’s No Child Left Behind law. Critics of the law found little evidence to support that conclusion.
In math, U.S. fourth-graders ranked No. 11 on the international test, 15 surpassed by eight countries, led by China, Singapore and Japan, researchers said.
.U.S. fourth-graders on average scored 529 in 2007, up from 518 in both 2003 and 1995. The results are reported on a zero to 1,000-point scale, with 500 16 the international average. Top-performing China scored 607. U.S. eighth-graders ranked No. 9 in math with a score of 508, behind many of the 17 Asian countries atop the fourth-grade chart.
“In math, the U.S. is making 18 progress,” says Michael O. Martin, one of the directors of the study at Boston College, which 19_ the test. But Mr. Martin said he worried about the huge gap between the U.S. and Asian countries, which aren’t 20 on their laurels.
A) management I) representing
B) truly J) takes
C) steady K) promoted
D) resting L) same
E) released M) administers
F) rapid N) words
G) roughly O) competitiveness
H) results
■ Section B
Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished sentences. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice.
Passage One
Questions 21 to 25 are based on the following passage.
Hardly a week goes by without some advance in technology that would have seemed incredible 50 years ago. And we can expect the rate of change to accelerate rather than slow down within our lifetime. The developments in technology are bound to have a dramatic effect on the future of work. By 2010, new technology will have revolutionized communications. People will be transmitting messages down telephone lines that previously would have been sent by post. Not only postmen but also clerks and secretaries will vanish in a paper-free society. All the routine tasks they perform will be carried on a tiny silicon chip so that they will be as obsolete as the horse and cart after the invention of the motorcar. One change will make thousands, if not millions, redundant.
.Even people in traditional professions, where expert knowledge has been the key, are unlikely to escape the effects of new technology. Instead of going to a solicitor, you might go to a computer that is programmed with all the most up-to-date legal information. Doctors, too, will find that an electronic competitor will be able to carry out a much quicker and more accurate diagnosis and recommend more efficient courses of treatment. In education, teachers will be largely replaced by teaching machines far more knowledgeable than any human being. Most learning will take place in the home via video conferencing. Children will still go to school though, until another place is created where they can make friends and develop social skills.
What can we do to avoid the threat of unemployment? We shouldn’t hide our heads in the sand. Unions will try to stop change but they will be fighting a losing battle. People should get computer literate as this just might save them from professional extinction. After all, there will be a few jobs left in law, education and medicine for those few individuals who are capable of writing and programming the software of the future. Strangely enough, there will still be jobs like rubbish collection and cleaning as it is tough to program tasks that are largely unpredictable.
21. According to the author, the rate of change in technology _________.
A) will remain the same B) will slow down C) will speed up D) cannot be predicted
22. The author expects that by 2010 new technology will have revolutionized communications and _______.
A) bookshops will not exist B) the present postal system will disappear
C) people will no longer write letters D) postmen will have been replaced by the motorcar
23. From the passage, we can infer that ______.
A) professionals won’t be affected by new technology
B) doctors won’t be as efficient as computers
C) computers cannot replace lawyers
D) experts will know less in the future
24. The passage tells us that in the future ______.
A) children will not be taught in schools B) no teachers will be needed
C) teachers will be less knowledgeable D) children will learn social skills at school
.25. In the writer’s view, ______.
A) people should be prepared for the future B) there exists no threat of unemployment
C) unions can stop the unfavorable changes D) people had better become cleaners
Passage Two
Questions 26 to 30 are based on the following passage.
When it comes to singling out those who have made a difference in all our lives, you cannot overlook Henry Ford. A historian a century from now might well conclude that it was Ford who most influenced all manufacturing, everywhere, even to this day, by introducing a new way to make cars — one, strange to say, that originated in slaughterhouses.
Back in the early 1900’s, slaughterhouses used what could have been called a “disassembly line”. Ford reversed this process to see if it would speed up production of a part of an automobile engine called a magneto (磁发电机). Rather than have each worker completely assemble a magneto, one of its elements was placed on a conveyer, and each worker, as it passed, added another component to it, the same one each time. Professor David Hounshell of the University of Delaware, an expert on industrial development, tells what happened:
“The previous day, workers carrying out the entire process averaged one assembly every 20 minutes. But on that day, on the line, the assembly team averaged one every 13 minutes and 10 seconds per person.”
Within a year, the time had been reduced to five minutes. In 1913, Ford went all the way. Hooked together by ropes, partially assembled vehicles were towed past workers who completed them one piece at a time. It wasn’t long before Ford was turning out several hundred thousand cars a year, a remarkable achievement then. And so efficient and economical was this new system that he cut the price of his cars in half, to $260, putting them within reach of all those who, up until that time, could not afford them. Soon, auto makers all over the world copied him. In fact, he encouraged them to do so by writing a book about all of his innovations, entitled Today and Tomorrow. The Age of the Automobile had arrived. Today, aided by robots and other forms of automation, everything from toasters to perfumes is made on assembly lines.
26. In Paragraph 1, the author gives a historian’s statement about Henry Ford to show _________.
A) Henry Ford is quite popular with historians
B) historians are quite interested in Henry Ford
C) Henry Ford’s influence on history can hardly be ignored
D) manufacturing is among the subjects of historians’ study
.27. The underlined word “disassembly” in Paragraph 2 most probably means ______.
A) putting together B) establishing C) manufacturing D) taking apart
28. All of the following statements are true, EXCEPT that ________.
A) the invention of the assembly line has changed our lives
B) Henry Ford influenced virtually all manufacturing
C) Henry Ford’s experiment on the magneto was an immediate success
D) cars were originally manufactured in slaughterhouses
29. It can be inferred from this passage that _________.
A) more people could afford a car thanks to the assembly line
B) Henry Ford was forced to cut the price of the cars because of market competition
C) Henry Ford cut the production of his cars by 50% to reduce costs
D) Henry Ford was reluctant to share his invention with others
30. This passage mainly tells us ________.
A) the history of car manufacturing
B) the origin and influence of the assembly line on all manufacturing
C) the process of car manufacturing
D) the role of technology in raising production
Part IV Cloze (15 minutes)
Directions: There are 20 blanks in the following passage. For each blank there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should choose the ONE that best fits into the passage.
.It was one of the happiest times of my life. I was 29 and had just received my bachelor’s degree, graduating with 31 despite working two jobs and being a wife and mother. My parents and five-year-old son were in the 32 when I walked onto the stage at Ashland University to get my diploma. I was so excited and proud to be starting a 33 career and contributing more to my family’s well-being.
But when I got home that evening, there was a note from my husband, 34 ,“I’ve come to get my clothes and won’t be back.” We’d been having trouble, 35 the finality of that note still came as a shock. He had emptied our bank account. We were horribly in debt. I had quit my 36 jobs in anticipation of interviewing for a teaching position. 37 , I was eight months pregnant.
The reality was so merciless that I was embarrassed, 38 , and angry and felt I 39 . But I had my son, and I was about to 40 a new life into the world, so 41 my deep sadness, I had to go on. The next morning, I woke up (literally and figuratively), put my feet on the floor, took a deep breath, fixed breakfast, and 42 did everything I always did. I used my routine to keep me moving.
And in the seven years 43 , I’ve continued moving forward. I got a job as a kindergarten teacher, earned a master’s degree in education, and watched my babies grow to 12 and 44 . I certainly would never have 45 to put them through this, but in retrospect (回顾), I’m glad it
46 to me when it did. It helped me grow 47 , confident, and strong — things I’m hopefully instilling now in my children. 48 life throws you a curve ball, hands you a lemon, or knocks you for a loop. But knowing 49 failure can be the first step to success. This is my latest belief and strategy on 50 to win in the end.
31. A) joys B) anxieties C) excitements D) honors
32. A) emergence B) absence C) audience D) presence
33. A) gardening B) teaching C) nursing D) repairing
34. A) saying B) meaning C) expressing D) talking
35. A) but B) and C) though D) so
36. A) precautious B) previous C) present D) precious
.