1、专业英语八级（作文）模拟试卷 70及答案与解析 一、 PART V WRITING 1 Its a common misconception that poverty alleviation is all about financial aid. People regard this as the most effective way to help the poor. However, some hold that helping the poor with education is more important than donating money. The following exce
2、rpts are opinions toward the means of poverty alleviation. Write an article of NO LESS THAN 300 words, in which you should: 1. summarize briefly the arguments on both sides; 2. give your suggestions on the means of poverty alleviation. Excerpt 1 Giving money isnt even a way to help the poor if it wa
3、s then the various charities should have solved the poverty problem ages ago. Here on TV every day we see terrible pictures and hear the mournful voiceover asking us to save a child from lack of clean water, starvation, or illness usually somewhere in Africa. I have heard the same pleas all my adult
4、 life and still the problem persists or has got worse, surely in nearly 60 years the people of the West have given enough money to the charities to drill a few thousand wells and buy enough food to feed the entire population. yet it goes on and on. So therefore I say whatever they have been doing an
5、d are still doing is not the answer. Educating people how to earn money for themselves is more of a help. As an old Chinese proverb goes: Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. I am in favour of teaching people to fish and farm so that they
6、 learn to provide for their own. However, you cannot fish in a dry river nor farm where there is no rain. For charities to continue to sustain life where life cannot sustain itself is madness there just has to be a better way. Excerpt 2 Poverty is more than just a lack of income. Poverty encompasses
7、 a lack of money, education, resources, housing stability, safety, opportunities, etc. It is a complex issue. I worked for over a year helping to house the homeless and I now work as a self sufficiency specialist to help enable those in poverty rise above their circumstances. Where I work we have si
8、x categories which have shown reliability and validity when it comes to self sufficiency. Income, either fixed (disability, SSI, retirement, earned, etc), Housing (stable is required, other options are unstable and literally homeless), Food, Education, Transportation, and Health Care. If a client is
9、 lacking in any of these areas they are at risk for falling back into poverty and/or remaining in poverty. Therefore, money can make a huge impact when applied correctly. However, if all we do is pay for the current shut off and provide them with no other resources or opportunities to change the sit
10、uation overall, they will need another shut-off assist the very next month. Other ways to help the poor include volunteering at a food bank, volunteering to teach a skill you excel at such as budgeting, how to do your own oil change, writing a resume, etc. Time and knowledge are just as valuable, if
11、 not more so, than money. 2 Debates over how to treat criminals have gone on since the judicial system founded. Across the world, imprisonment is the most common means to use in most countries, but the challenges to the effectiveness of prison as punishment never ceases. The follow news report provi
12、des a possible alternative to imprisonment. Read it carefully and write your response in NO LESS THAN 300 words, in which you should: 1. summarize briefly the news report; 2. give your comment. Community Service: A Productive Way to Punish Homeless at the age of 46, Martin “boosts“ goods from New Yo
13、rk City department stores, resells them for money to purchase a week or two at a cheap hotel, then steals again when the money runs out. This way of life often lands him in court, where he faces the standard sentences of sixty or ninety days in jail. Some judges, however, consider that a waste: Cell
14、s cost money, and Martin isnt that dangerous. They would rather use the leverage his conviction has given them to get some honest work out of him, and the citys Community Service Sentencing Project gives them a reliable way to do so. That suits Martin just fine. “Jail is overcrowded,“ he complains.
15、And you have a lot of gangs going on in jail now. People get stabbed up, killed. But many other New Yorkers also see the benefit of his alternative sentencing: He has cleared lots for communal gardens, cleaned up a YMCA, painted low-income housing units, and performed other sundry tasks for neighbor
16、hood groups around the city. As he and hundreds of other petty criminals do such jobs under supervision of the courts, they demonstrate both the possibilities for saving on jail costs and constructive use of work as a sanction. Judges typically impose the sentences according to formula for example,
17、six hours of work equal one day of jail. The offenders are interviewed to determine their skills and availability, then matched with jobs at government or nonprofit agencies. The probation department handles enforcement and eventual referral of failed cases hack to the court for resentencing. It is
18、hard to determine how much community service serves as a substitute for jail or prison. The argument for the sanction looks compelling: Sentencing a person to community service spares the huge expense of incarceration. There is some reason to believe that use of the sanction as a genuine alternative
19、 increased in subsequent years. As courts continued to feel the pressures of jail crowding, the advantages of community service appeared more obvious than ever, and judges sought ways to make the most of it. As the federal government brought pressure for tougher laws against drunk driving, for examp
20、le, community service became the sentence of choice, especially for offenders with stable jobs and families. Sandy Seely, former head of the National Community Sentencing Association, says that today, even drunk drivers found guilty of vehicular homicide may wind up working off their debt to society
21、 at a community service site rather then doing time behind bars. “Its a sentence that the victims family usually agrees to, she says. In addition, states that impose escalating sanctions intensive probation supervision, electronic monitoring, day treatment, restitution that substitute for jail may i
22、nclude community service as part of a sentence package. And a few jurisdictions have set up programs that substitute community service for jail but call it something else. 3 Seventy outstanding sanitation workers from Yibin, Sichuan province, were sent to Singapore on a study tour, which has sparked
23、 online controversy. From the following excerpts, you can find different opinions towards this practice. Write an article of NO LESS THAN 300 words, in which you should: 1. summarize briefly the arguments on both sides; 2. give your comment. Yu Wenjun () In some peoples minds, overseas study tours a
24、re only a privilege for government officials or researchers, while street sweepers have nothing to do with it. The practice of the government of Yibin shows respect to ordinary workers. This demeanor shows that the social divisions of labor dont mean that any career is inferior to another. As long a
25、s people can make real contributions to society, they should get the reward they deserve. Its a positive signal for building a harmonious society. Sending street sweepers for overseas study tours is not letting them travel at public expense. Street sweepers are important decorators of the city and t
26、he guards of the image of a city. Like anyone else, they also need some opportunities to broaden their horizons, such as studying abroad. Sending them for study tours is a change of concept. Its narrow-minded to regard this only as a travel tour at public expense. In order to make it more effective,
27、 those street sweepers must be carefully selected. Besides, after the tour, the local government should make sure all the knowledge they have learned must be fully digested and put into good use. Study tours at public expense arent all corruption. If they are helpful for work, we should encourage th
28、em. We shouldnt abandon them once and for all just because there may be corruption in such tours. Liu Chuhan (XVan Evening News) The original purpose for this study tour is said to be learning about advanced experience to improve domestic practice in this area. The purpose sounds good. But, is it re
29、ally necessary to go abroad to learn about advanced experiences? Will the experiences be suitable for us? Even if they have really learned suitable experiences, can those more advanced working patterns be effectively implemented in China? Second, the tour is sponsored by the government Then, is the
30、study tour necessary? Is the input-output ratio good enough? We cant ignore these questions just because it is street sweepers that go for the study tour rather than government leaders. The decision should be made after careful consideration and assessment and the whole process must be under strict
31、supervision. Another possibility is that they sent out street sweepers to give them a reward for their previous hard work. Some street sweepers even say they would rather have more salary or more holiday allowance than the seemingly fancy study tours. Its all right to give them an overseas holiday a
32、s a reward, but it shouldnt be in the name of a study tour. If so, isnt it a kind of corruption? Overseas study tours must be strictly supervised and controlled. Traveling at public expense in the name of study tours must be stopped. No matter if leaders or ordinary workers go for the study tour, it
33、 must be put under strict public supervision. 4 A residential community in a small city in China has been christened Venice. Another is named Manhattan after the famous New York borough. These are just a couple of examples of the current phenomenon sweeping construction sites across China: naming th
34、em after Western landmarks. Some worry that the trend is eroding local and traditional culture as well as confusing residents. The Chinese government recently decided to standardize the naming of streets, residential communities and parks. From the following excerpts, you can find different opinions
35、 toward this decision. Write an article of NO LESS THAN 300 words, in which you should: 1. summarize briefly the arguments on both sides; 2. express your own opinion, especially on whether foreign style names should be banned. Excerpt 1 Guo Xilin from N Today, foreign names can be seen everywhere, p
36、articularly on commercial buildings, and real estate developers are increasingly naming residential communities in an international style. Superficially, these are just names. But if you look deeper, you will see that this penetration of foreign names will have a negative impact on traditional Chine
37、se culture. We offer our full support for the governments correction of the foreign names scattered across the country. Its also important to hold accountable those responsible for arbitrarily selecting new names. To a large extent, the influx in foreign naming is a result of loose local government
38、supervision. We need to learn from the rest of the world, but not in terms of names. Take big Chinese cities for example. The cities need to be run at an international level, but they shouldnt copy foreign names. A location must have unique local characteristics if it is to be well remembered around
39、 the world. If we use Western names to label our streets, residential communities and so on, its actually a blow to Chinese culture. It is of vital importance that we stop destroying old constructions and replacing ancient names and local features with Western names, however fashionable they may sou
40、nd. Excerpt 2 Tuo Xingang from Changsha Evening News The authorities decision to deal with weird names will easily win support, as these names obviously create problems. But how do you define “weird“ names? There are no clear standards, and when there is an absence of standards, questions will arise
41、. Sometimes, a weird name might have a unique historical background. The judgment of whether a name is weird should be based on careful analyses, not just the characters included in the name. A place given a foreign name could have stories, legends or a historical background associated with the name
42、. These place names should also be protected. For example, Shanghai has a number of Western-style buildings that have witnessed the development of the city for almost a century. The public long ago accepted the foreign names of these buildings. Thus, in this round of name rectification, its importan
43、t to take a prudent attitude and treat the so-called “weird“ names in different ways. The government needs to give an ear to local people when cleaning up names across the country. There should also be a list for places with names of special cultural and historical significance. These names should b
44、e put on the protection list. We have already lost too much cultural heritage and no more should be lost in the process of correcting place names. Standard names are easier to remember and more convenient to use, and thus tend to be better protected, while place names that are of great historical an
45、d cultural significance but not so convenient to use or may even seem “weird“ should receive more attention. The preservation of the latter is of great importance culturally. 专业英语八级（作文）模拟试卷 70答案与解析 一、 PART V WRITING 1 【正确答案】 Want to Help the Poor? Just Give Them Money Many people are disconcerted by
46、 the idea of giving money directly to the poor, afraid that without regulations the money would be misused and wasted. The first excerpt echoes this notion, suggesting that education is a more effective alternative to financial aid, as teaching a man to fish works better than giving him a fish. Alth
47、ough the second excerpt underlines the importance of money, it points out that money alone cannot eliminate poverty, and there should be other types of help, such as provision of resources, opportunities, and knowledge. I agree that other kinds of assistance could be considered, but financial suppor
48、t, or more precisely cash transfer, is the best way to help the poor. For decades, it was thought that the poor needed everything done for them. Few people would trust anyone to spend a large sum of money responsibly. Thus governments and charities rationed everything, from food to medical supplies,
49、 school to public transportation, with people living in poverty denied the right to make decisions about their needs and priorities. However, we should realize that poverty is as much a deficit in power as a material lack. Why do we think poor people cannot manage money well? In reality, the growing practice and success of cash transfer show that giving money away indeed pulls people out of poverty. According to an experiment conducted by GiveDirectly, a charity trying to help poor people by sending them money with no strings
