Earlier this month, California police cleared what was said to be the largest homeless encampment in the United States. About 200 homeless people were living at the camp in San Jose, California. Officials said police officers and city workers acted because the area was unclean.
The homeless people were living near Silicon Valley, the country's high technology center. Some people there have made millions, even billions of dollars from high-tech devices and services. But others have no money and no place to live.
Federal officials believe there are hundreds of thousands of homeless people nationwide on any given day. Each one lacks a permanent place to live. Reasons for homelessness can include the high cost of housing, poverty and unemployment. Other reasons are mental health problems and just plain bad luck.
In Los Angeles, a group called PATH searches along flood channels and major roads for homeless camps.. Its workers look for people who have no permanent shelter.
Jorge Guzman was one of the people hoping to help the homeless. He says they make their camps where they are not seen -- behind buildings or in forests or parks.
"They just don't want to be noticed. They're doing their thing out here and, you know, they're just trying to survive."
City workers periodically clear away small trees and plants, uncovering homeless campers. Workers in Whittier try to move people out of homeless camps and into a home of their own. But housing is costly. Still, worker Tomasz says he has been able to help some people.
"It's really good to see the steps when people are leaving their encampments and they're transitioning to either transitional housing, and after when they obtain their own housing."
But there are many other homeless people still living on the streets or in camps, moving when their campsites are taken down.Why did California police clear the homeless encampment?
| A．Because the area was unclean. |
| B．Because the homeless people often fight. |
| C．Because the government has built new houses for them. |
| D．Because they badly affected the image of the city. |
Which is NOT the reason causing homelessness?
| A．Mental health problems | B．Plain bad luck |
| C．Being abandoned. | D．The high cost of housing, |
According to the passage ,where may the homeless live?
| A．In buildings behind parks. |
| B．In camps in forests. |
| C．In apartments near Silicon Valley |
| D．In permanent shelters. |
We can describe Tomasz as ____.
| A．generous | B．honest |
| C． grateful | D．helpful |
Which of the following can replace the underlined phrase “take down”?
| A．Write down. | B．Break down. |
| C．Pull down. | D．Set down. |
How many coins nave you got in your pocket right now? Three? Two？ A bent one？
With a phonecard you can make up to 200 calls without any change at all.
（1） What do you do with it?
Go to a telephone box marked（you guessed it）“phonecard”.Put in your card, make your call and when you’ve finished, a screen tells you how much is left on your card.
（2） Now appear in a shop near you.
Near each Cardphone place you’ll find a shop where you can buy one. They’re at bus, train and city tube stations（地铁）.
Many universities, hospitals and clubs. Restaurants and gas stations on the highway and shopping centres. At airports and seaports.
（3） No more broken payphones.
Most broken payphones are like that because they’ve been vandalized（故意破坏）. There are no coins in Cardphone to excite thieves’ interest in it. So you’re not probably to find a vandalized one.
Get a phonecard yourself and try it out ,or get a bigger wallet.The passage is most probably ________ .
| A．a warning |
| B．a note |
| C．an advertisement（广告） |
| D．an announcement |
There are three sections（部分） in the passage. Which section do you think is about why phonecards are good?
| A．Section 1． | B．Section 2． |
| C．Section 3． | D．None. |
Choose the right order or the steps under“How do you use a phonecard”.
a. Put in your phonecard.
b. Look at the screen to find out how many calls you can still make.
c. Go to a telephone box marked “Phonecard”.
d. Make your call.
| A．a, b, c, d | B．c, a, d, b |
| C．a, d, c, b | D．c, d, a, b |
An explosion on Thursday killed one and injured 21 in a busy street in Tongren, Southwest China’s Guizhou Province.
The bomb was hidden in a rubbish bin in the city’s commercial hub（商业中心），where lots of shops and restaurants are concentrated.
The ear-splitting blast was heard around 12∶50 p.m.，said a local newspaper, citing witnesses. The power of the blast shattered（使粉碎）nearby shop windows and ripped the stainless（不生锈的）steel rubbish can to pieces.
One passer-by，identified（确认）only as Zhang，said she was shocked by the noise and saw a lot of pedestrians lying on the ground when she got to the scene.
Thirteen of the injured were taken to a local hospital after the explosion. A doctor there said five were in serious condition but already out of danger after emergency treatment. The others were just slightly hurt.
The cause of the explosion is still under investigation, said an officer with the Tongren police, but refused to speculate as to the cause.
It can be inferred from the passage that ________.
| A．All the injured were taken to a hospital |
| B．8 of the injured were not taken to a hospital |
| C．The rubbish bin with a bomb was in a restaurant |
| D．The rubbish bin with a bomb was in a shop |
Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
| A．One passer- by, indentified only as Zhang, saw the man throwing a bomb into a bin. |
| B．Some customers in restaurants were injured. |
| C．The writer didn’t get to the scene. |
| D．All customers in shops got hurt. |
In the last paragraph the underlined word“ speculate” probably means ________.
| A．tell | B．guess |
| C．discuss | D．talk |
What of the follwing can be the best title for the passage?
| A．Bomb Hidden in a Rubbish Bin |
| B．The Cause of the Explosion |
| C．A Terrible Thing |
| D．Market Blast Kills 1 ,Injures 21 |
As is known to all, the organization and management of wages and salaries are very complex.
Generally speaking, the Accounts Department is responsible for calculations of pay, while the Personnel Department(人事部) is interested in discussions with the employees about pay.
If a firm wants to adopt a new wage and salary structure, it is essential that the firm should decide on a method of job evaluation(估价) and ways of measuring the performance of its employees. In order to be successful, that new pay structure will need agreement between Trade Unions and employers.
In job evaluation, all the requirements of each job are defined in a detailed job description. Each of those requirements is given a value, usually in “points”, which are added together to give a total value for the job. For middle and higher management, a special method is used to evaluate managers on their knowledge of the job, their responsibility, and their ability to solve problems.
Because of the difficulty in measuring management work, however, job grades for managers are often decided without reference to an evaluation system based on points.
In attempting to design a pay system, the Personnel Department should compare the value of each job with those in the job market. It should also consider economic factors such as the cost of living and the labor supply.
It is necessary that payment for a job should vary with any differences in the way that the job is performed. Where it is simply to measure the work done, as in the work done with the hands, monetary encouragement schemes are often chosen; for indirect workers, where measurement is difficult, methods of additional payments are employed. If a firm wants to establish a new pay structure, it is necessary to get the agreement between________.
| A．the Trade Unions and the Personnel Department |
| B．the Personnel Department and the Accounts Department |
| C．the employees and the Trade Unions. |
| D．the employers and the Trade Unions |
What does the words “monetary encouragement schemes” in the last paragraph imply?
| A．They are plans in which much payment is encouraged. |
| B．They are encouraging money schedules |
| C．They are pay systems |
| D．They are pay systems to encourage workers in that the more work is done, the more money will be paid. |
Methods of additional payments are adopted for indirect workers because________.
| A．their work is not important | B．they have low wages |
| C．the measurement of their work is difficult | D．the company does not have enough money |
Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the text?
| A．In every company only the Accounts Department takes charge of the management of wages and salaries. |
| B．Management work and the job done by workers can use the same evaluation system. |
| C．If a job is done differently, the payment for the job should be different too. |
| D．An evaluation system based on points is usually used to evaluate management work. |
The main purpose of the passage is to________.
| A．explain the responsibilities of both the Accounts Department and the Personnel Department. |
| B．explain not to evaluate the performance of a job by points |
| C．tell readers how a company should adopt a new payment system |
| D．convince(使确信) readers that management work is more difficult to evaluate than the work done by workers |
The following form shows the result of a survey (调查) of parents from five countries, who were asked why children are important to them. They were required to choose three main reasons from seven dealing with personal interests, family relations and social responsibility(责任). Each number in the form is the percentage (%) of parents who chose that particular item(项) as one of their three reasons. Therefore, the most common for Japanese parents are strengthening family ties (Item D, 51%), learning from the experience (Item E, 60%), and raising responsible citizens (Item, G 45%).
| Items |
Japan |
Korea |
U.S.A |
Britain |
France |
| A.To see oneself continuing in future |
35 |
32 |
31 |
17 |
59 |
| B. To keep the family line |
24 |
68 |
28 |
17 |
26 |
| C. To receive care in old age |
10 |
38 |
8 |
7 |
8 |
| D. To strengthen family ties |
51 |
25 |
50 |
55 |
66 |
| E.To develop oneself through raising one’s children |
60 |
19 |
54 |
69 |
35 |
| F. To enjoy raising one’s children |
20 |
19 |
50 |
71 |
39 |
| G. To raise responsible citizens |
45 |
40 |
46 |
28 |
15 |
According to this survey, Korean parents are most interested in .
| A．continuing their family | B．obtaining care in old age |
| C．strengthening family relationship | D．caring for raising children |
How many items are chosen by parents of more than two countries as main reasons?
| A．Two. | B．Three. | C．Four. | D．Five. |
From the percentages in items _______, we can see the following difference between the Asian and the European countries: the Asian parents want to devote themselves to future societies through children; the European parents enjoy the course of raising children.
| A．B and C | B．D and F | C．E and F | D．F and G |
According to the form, which of the following is true?
| A．From the main reasons shown in the form it seems that in every country parents do not expect care from children in their old age. |
| B．Japanese parents share two of their main reasons with the British and American parents, and the third one with Korean parents. |
| C．More than half of the parents from each country chose the reason“tostrengthen family ties”and for each it was one of the three main reasons for having children. |
| D．The percentage of French parents selecting the reason“to see oneself continuing in future”is about as high as that of the other countries. |
SOUTHPORT, ENGLAND—A British teaching union famous for strange ideas has supported a plan to employ dogs as classroom assistants.
At the yearly conference of the Professional Association of Teachers in Southport, northwest England, one person suggested properly trained dogs be able to keep order in primary schools. They can round up lost children and protect those who experience unfortunate “accidents”. Wendy Dyble, a Sheetland Islands woman who teaches children up to age seven, made it clear to her fellow friends that she was not “barking mad”. They obviously believed her, supporting her idea by 16 votes to 13, with a total of 63 abstentions（弃权）.
She said big dogs could help round up children, keep them in line, lick up the milk they spill on the floor and provide the extra eyes that a teacher needs to keep order. “A big dog would also be helpful for stopping flights and look for lost property, like gym shoes or dolls,” Dyble said at the conference. “The dog will also be useful in sniffing out(find out) smells that children do not own up to,” she added. “It would be nice for the teacher not to have to go round sniffing each child to find the criminal.”
The idea was welcomed by the Dog Defense League but less by bigger teaching unions. A spokesman for Education Secretary, David Blunkett, who is blind, said his guide dog was always popular with pupils when he visited schools. The Professional Association of Teachers, with around 35,000 members, is the smallest teaching union in Britain. It has an honor for occasional strange ideas.
Earlier this week, its yearly conference here suggested stopping exams because they lead to stress and introducing selection at the age of 12 based on physical coordination（调整）and manual（手工的）skill.According to the writer’s opinion, to employ dogs as classroom assistants ________.
| A．is not a good idea |
| B．can improve the relation between children and animals |
| C．is beyond ordinary people’s imagination |
| D．can make some teachers lose jobs |
What Dyble said at the conference ________.
| A．gained some support from the members |
| B．frightened everyone present |
| C．interested everyone present |
| D．caused some trouble to trained dogs |
The last paragraph of this passage ________.
| A．has nothing to do with the topic of this passage |
| B．shows there are too many exams in British school |
| C．provides further facts about the teaching union |
| D．shows the writer’s anger to the union |