上海高级口译证书有效期 年3月高级口译上半场阅读理解第二篇原文

年3月高级口译上半场阅读理解第二篇原文  

raising the school-leaving age will make teachers ill

It’s the start of the new school year. The bell's gone
30-odd pupils have shuffled into class and you're now facing a roomful of stroppy 17-year-olds who very vocally don't want to be there.
As a teacher
this may well be your daily reality in 2015
when all young people up to the age of 18 will have to be either in full-time education or work-based training.
And based on what happened in Spain when the school-leaving age was raised from 14 to 16 in 1998
new research from economists at Lancaster University warns that schools could be hit with mass absenteeism when teachers find themselves unable to do their job because half their class isn't interested.
Colin Green
senior lecturer at Lancaster University management school
says evidence from Spain shows that raising the pulsory "participation age" is likely to result in lower job satisfaction for teachers
greater problems with stress
and and more people leaving the profession.
Employers
he points out
will have a choice as to which young people they take on. Schools
by contrast
will have a duty to accept all ers. This means there is likely to be a large cohort of teenagers who would much rather have left school
but who will be required to spend o years more with their heads in a book.
For sixth-form. teachers
who have till now looked forward to lessons with keen-as-mustard – or at least moderately willing – A-level students
the dynamic of every class is likely to change dramatically
and is unlikely to be conducive to better learning outes for any of those involved.
Given this prospect
says Green
teachers should pay attention to how their day-to-day working lives will be affected when the school-leaving age goes up.
The study
done in collaboration with his research associate Maria Navarro
shows that as soon as Spain raised the statutory leaving age
"secondary school teacher absenteeism rose sharply – on average
by beeen 15% to 20%".
"And it wasn't a one-off
" Green says. "Absence rates have stayed high in all the years following the reform. And the increase in teacher absenteeism has clear implications for the quality of education that students receive."
A particularly troubling finding
he notes
is that increases in teacher absence was even higher in areas where fewer children traditionally stayed on in school
reaching 40% in the worst areas."Teachers in these schools faced the largest change in the mix of students after the policy was implemented."
Of course
it's the areas with larger proportions of teenagers who would prefer to leave school that most need extra professional support. But instead
because teachers will find themselves under more pressure
classes are likely to be more disrupted
and absence rates will shoot through the roof. "There's a real danger
" Green says
"that the policy will decrease the quality of education and training provision."
Green is not scaremongering. Previous research has shown that teacher absence is a cause of poor pupil achievement. Worse still
the negative effects of teachers being absent in large numbers for long periods are more severe for poorer pupils.
Given growing concern about the large numbers of young people in England who leave school with few qualifications and prospects
Green observes that the raising of the school-leaving age was virtually inevitable. "The profile of the August rioters will have added further steel to the mitment to keep under-18s inside one system or another
" he says.
The problem the government faces
however
is that while many working in education might share the view that it's better for young people to remain in education or training
forcing reluctant teenagers to stay on at school may have the opposite effect to the one ministers intend. "The potential for a direct effect is clear: more students in schools and colleges will lead to more teaching hours and
in the absence of more teachers as a result of tightening budgets
either to an increase in teaching workloads or an increase in class sizes
" says Green.
"All the evidence suggests that teaching and managing these students
and bining their needs with those of young people who would have chosen to stay on already
is likely to present new and difficult challenges."
Absenteeism on the scale observed by Green and Navarro in Spain is only one indicator of the impact of raising the participation age that ministers need to take note of. Green suggests that
like all employees
if teachers are not pensated in some way for a significant change in the essential nature of their work – through improvements in working conditions or increased pay – it's likely to have a negative effect on how they feel about their professional purpose.
For the policy of raising the pulsory leaving age to be successful
ministers will be heavily dependent on teachers' willingness to flex and adapt and
put bluntly
work harder in more difficult conditions.
Green suggests that the government would do well to find out what teachers feel would repense them for the changes they'll have to make to their professional practice.
If nothing is done
he warns
"all these factors add up to the same thing – a poorer quality experience and level of opportunities for young people. There is the danger that schools will bee not the hoped-for platform. for development
encouragement and inspiration
but instead a 'holding' camp for a growing number of disengaged young people."