Text 2. Further or Higher Education

1. Read the text quickly and correct the plan below

1) Entrance to Universities, colleges

2) University degrees

3) Work and study at 16

4) Tutorial system

5) Money for education

At the age of sixteen people are free to leave school if they want to. Most school leavers do not find employment immediately and do not want to go to FE College. They may take part in training schemes (the Young Opportunities Scheme, YOPS) which involve on-the-job training combined with part-time college courses. Some young working people are given “day release” so they can follow a course to help them in their job.

The next stage is “further” education at university, college or Polytechnics. Polytechnics are similar to Universities, but the courses are more practically oriented. A number of Colleges of Further Education do vocational training courses for particular jobs and careers, for example in engineering, typing, cooking or hairdressing. There are 91 universities and 47 colleges of higher education. The availability of higher education and finding a university place is not easy. Universities, although financed by the government, have autonomy and each one has complete control over what to teach, how to teach it, and how to test the students. They make their own choices and accept only the better students on their courses. Universities normally select students on the basis of top grades in several A-level results and an interview, and competition for places is fierce.

The labour-intensive system of instruction known as tutorials has been polishing minds for 800 years. The strength of the tutorial system is that it’s almost impossible to be lazy under it. Within the first week the freshman meets the tutor to whom he is assigned and begins his work. Undergraduates, students who are studying for degrees, go to a large formal lectures, but most of the work takes place in tutorials, lessons in groups of ten or more when the students discuss their work with the lecturer.

The academic year in Britain’s universities is divided into three terms, which usually run from the beginning of October to the end of June or beginning of July. Universities offer three- and four-year degree courses. After three years of study a university graduate will leave with the Degree of Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), Science (B.Sc.), Engineering (B.Eng.), Medicine, etc. A degree is the qualification you get from the university when you pass your final exams. Later a university graduate may continue to take the Master’s Degree (M.A.) and then the Doctor’sDegree (PhD). Research is an important feature of university work.

Most British students choose to go to university a long way from their home town: university is seen as a time to be independent, to live away from home and develop new interests. Students need money to live away from home while they are studying. Some students whose parents do not earn a lot of money are given a grant (money) from the local educational authority. Some students borrow money from the bank which must be paid back after they leave university.

Not all students study full-time at university or college. Many people combine their studies with work. Some companies release their stuff for training one or two days a week or for two months a year. There is an interesting form of studies which is called the Open University, when people study in their own free time and “attend” lectures by watching television, listening radio, using Internet. They keep in touch with their tutors by phone, letter or on-line.

2. Read the text more carefully and complete the sentences.

a) If a school leaver doesn’t want to go to a college or cannot find a job he (she) can…….

b) Educational institutions of Further education include……….

c) Polytechnics are…….

d) The universities accept students on the…….

e) The university degrees are…….

f) There are several ways to get money for the education……….

g) Studying at the Open University students………….

3. Give full answers to these questions.

1) Why are some young working people given a “day release”?

2) What are the main characteristics of different higher educational institutions?

3) Are Universities controlled by the government?

4) Why is a tutorial system so efficient?

5) When do students get their first academic degree?

6) Why do most British students prefer to study away from their homes?

7) What should they do to get higher degrees?

8) Is a full-time study the only way to get higher education?

9*) What are advantages and disadvantages of studying at the Open University?

10*) What do you like and dislike about the British system of professional education?

4. Translate using the dictionary.

From “Oxford life”

(by Dacre Balsden)

Lectures start on the first Monday of term. Lecturers are sometimes in fashion; lectures as such are never in fashion.

Why take notes when you could as well read it all in a book? The question is unanswerable.

In some subjects the lecture-list is itself carefully organized by the Faculty, so that all the necessary lectures are given and given in the terms in which undergraduates need them. In other faculties the freedom of the lecturer is not so rigidly curtailed. Let a lecturer lecture on whatever subject he chosen. If he hopes for an audience, he will choose a subject useful to undergraduates, and he will lecture on it twice a week. If he does not care about the size of his audience and prefers to lecture on some small field of learning on which he is researching or writing a learned paper, he will lecture one hour a week.

Dons in general hate lectures as much as undergraduates. That is why they lecture so badly. Nobody has ever taught them how to lecture well.

On the first Monday the lecturer has his largest audience for the term. Where there are a hundred young men and women today, there will, in eight weeks times, be no more than five or six. Where there is an audience of two today, there will perhaps be one next week and, after that, no audience at all.

A professor’s lecture is sometimes like the “pas seul ” * of a prima ballerina. He appears; he lectures; he retires. And then after an interval, he lectures again. But the College tutor’s public lecture is an interruption in a week otherwise devoted to teaching pupils in his rooms, listening to their essays and talking about them. These are “private hours” – “tutes”, as the undergraduates call them, or tutorials. Sometimes a student comes alone, sometimes in a pair, sometimes with two or three others.

Young tutors find the hour too long, old tutors find it too short. Undergraduates find it very long indeed and if there is no clock in the room, they find it even longer. When you reach a tutor’s age, it is less easy to listen than to talk, and observant undergraduates quickly realize that their tutors criticize in detail the final sentences of their essays but give little evidence of having observed the rest.

* pas seul [ֽpα: 'sə:l] (фр) сольный танец

5*. Read the advertisement of Sheffield University from “Railway Gazette” and translate it into Russian:

6. Write the facts about English higher education that interested you most of all.

(4-5 sentences).

7. What questions could you ask to get these answers?

1. No, they have to finance their own studies.
2. There isn’t much difference; it’s just that the courses are more practical in a polytechnic instead of being very academic.
3. It’s sixteen, but a lot of kids stay on until eighteen.
4. Because you can get higher education and earn some money.

2.3 Speaking.

1. Number these reasons why people enter universities in their order of importance from 1(most important reason) to 12 (least important reason).

to acquire general knowledge

to prepare for job

to meet with young people

to train one’s memory

to learn something about subjects

to find out what one is really interested in

to give one’s parents some peace and quiet

to test one’s intelligence

to learn how to study and work with books

to have a good time

to be independent

to learn discipline and order

2. Discuss with your partner.

a) Advantages and disadvantages of studying far from home.

b) Higher education is necessary to every young man.

c) No entrance exams. Think of pros and cons.

d) In British universities students are not obliged to attend all lectures. Is it good?

3. Here are some decisions that British students have to make:

at 16 – stay on at school?

- look for a job?

- apply for a place on a Young Opportunity Scheme?

- go to the Sixth Form College?

at 18 – go to University or a college?

- get a job?

- start a training course?

- do voluntary work?

- travel and work abroad?

- move away from home?

Make a list of decisions that students have to make in your educational system.

4. Render these texts in English* or in Russian.

1.

This is how a student spends his day. His working hours are from 9 to 1. At 9 o’clock he will see the tutor or go to the library, or to the lecture. From 2 to 5 he is engaged in sport and all kinds of exercise to prove himself on river or field. From 5 to 7 he usually either works in the library or in the laboratory. 7 o’clock is the dinner-hour when the undergraduates and dons are gathered in the hall. After dinner the students have club activities, debating societies, etc. At 10 o’clock the student must be in the college and sit down to work for about 2 hours.

2.