2015年经济学人 芝加哥的学校 勤劳的奖励

Chicago's schools

Hard work rewarded

Rahm Emanuel's school reforms are working

Let me teach you some new words

“NO FAMILY should go to the poorhouse because they are giving their kid a crack at the American dream,” said Rahm Emanuel on January 9th. Chicago's mayor was presenting his plans for education at Kenwood Academy, a high school on the city's South Side.

On the same day in Tennessee, President Barack Obama announced plans to exempt¹ qualified² students from tuition fees at community colleges. The White House had taken a leaf out of Chicago's book, said Mr Emanuel, who last October introduced the Chicago STAR Scholarship, which pays the community-college tuition fees of the best graduates from Chicago's public-school system.

Mr Emanuel wants more students to enroll³ in a college and take courses (and, if they pass, get credits) while still in their last year of high school, which helps to reduce their tuition costs later. With the help of a donation of 500,000 over three years from General Electric, the programme will grow from almost 2,500 students to more than 6,000 next year. Kenwood Academy has more students in the programme than any other high school in Chicago.

Some of the toughest decisions Mr Emanuel had to make in his first term concerned schools. He demanded merit pay for teachers and a longer school day (Chicago's was only 5 hours 45 minutes) and earmarked for closure 50 half-empty schools in poor districts. Teachers went on strike for the first time in 25 years, but Mr Emanuel got the longer day and the closures went ahead in 2013. The teachers kept their seniority-based pay system.

Mr Emanuel ploughed some of the money saved by closures into charter schools, which made him even more unpopular with the teachers' unions. But charter schools have worked well in Chicago. The Noble Network, which already runs 16 charter high schools with 10,000 pupils and plans to have 20,000 by 2020, has an attendance rate of 94% (compared with 73% for Chicago public schools) and a drop-out rate of only 0.4% (compared with 4.7%). It also gets better results on the ACT, a college-readiness test. It has an even higher percentage of minority students (98% compared with 92% at Chicago public schools), and slightly less public funding.

Rosa Alanis, the principal of Golder College Prep, one of the Noble network schools, says all her pupils have a teacher as a designated adviser⁴, whom they see twice every school day. Attendance and performance are the advisers⁵' responsibility, so they go to great lengths to ensure their charges show up, dress properly in their uniform of grey trousers and blue sweaters, and work hard. Ms Alanis herself looked after a group of 13 “challenging” boys. In one case she even drove to a pupil's house to get him to come to school. He was still in his pyjamas⁶, but obeyed.

Mr Emanuel is keen on charter schools, but he didn't mention them when he presented his second-term plans for education. Instead he promised to put Wi-Fi in all classrooms, and to ensure that every family would be within three miles of a high school offering some special focus, such as science or the International Baccalaureate. Presumably, he did not want to annoy those who think that charter schools leave public schools in the dumps. In fact, competition has prodded⁷ public schools to shape up a bit. The drop-out rate has gone down and ACT scores have slightly improved, albeit⁸ from a very low level.

1 exempt   

adj.免除的；v.使免除；n.免税者，被免除义务者

参考例句：

• These goods are exempt from customs duties.这些货物免征关税。
• He is exempt from punishment about this thing.关于此事对他已免于处分。

2 qualified   

adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的

参考例句：

• He is qualified as a complete man of letters.他有资格当真正的文学家。
• We must note that we still lack qualified specialists.我们必须看到我们还缺乏有资质的专家。

3 enroll   

v.招收；登记；入学；参军；成为会员（英)enrol

参考例句：

• I should like to enroll all my children in the swimming class.我愿意让我的孩子们都参加游泳班。
• They enroll him as a member of the club.他们吸收他为俱乐部会员。

4 adviser   

n.劝告者，顾问

参考例句：

• They employed me as an adviser.他们聘请我当顾问。
• Our department has engaged a foreign teacher as phonetic adviser.我们系已经聘请了一位外籍老师作为语音顾问。

5 advisers   

顾问，劝告者( adviser的名词复数 )； （指导大学新生学科问题等的）指导教授

参考例句：

• a member of the President's favoured circle of advisers 总统宠爱的顾问班子中的一员
• She withdrew to confer with her advisers before announcing a decision. 她先去请教顾问然后再宣布决定。

6 pyjamas   

n.（宽大的）睡衣裤

参考例句：

• This pyjamas has many repairs.这件睡衣有许多修补过的地方。
• Martin was in his pyjamas.马丁穿着睡衣。

7 prodded   

v.刺，戳( prod的过去式和过去分词 )；刺激；促使；（用手指或尖物）戳

参考例句：

• She prodded him in the ribs to wake him up. 她用手指杵他的肋部把他叫醒。
• He prodded at the plate of fish with his fork. 他拿叉子戳弄着那盘鱼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 albeit   

conj.即使；纵使；虽然

参考例句：

• Albeit fictional,she seemed to have resolved the problem.虽然是虚构的，但是在她看来好象是解决了问题。
• Albeit he has failed twice,he is not discouraged.虽然失败了两次，但他并没有气馁。