2012年6月大学英语六级真题试卷及参考答案(4)

extra. Three year students get first crack at course registration. There are no changes in the number of courses professors teach or in their pay.

The three-year degree isn’t a new idea. Geniuses have always breezed through. Judson

College, a 350-student institution in Alabama, has offered students a three-year option for 40 years. Students attend “short terms” in May and June to earn the credits required for graduation. Bates College in Maine and Ball State University in Indiana are among other colleges offering three-year options.

Changes at the high-school level are also helping to make it easier for many students to earn their undergraduate degrees in less time. One of five students arrives at college today with

Advanced Placement (AP) credits amounting to a semester or more of college level work. Many universities, including large schools like the University of Texas, make it easy for these AP students to graduate faster.

For students who don’t plan to stop with an undergraduate degree, the three-year plan may have an even greater appeal. Dr. John Sergent, head of Vanderbilt University Medical School’s residency (住院医生) program, enrolled in Vanderbilt’s undergraduate college in 1959. He entered medical school after only three years as did four or five of his classmates.” My first year of medical school counted as my senior year, which meant I had to take three to four labs a week to get all my sciences in. I basically skipped my senior year,” says Sergent. He still had time to be a student senator and meet his wife.

There are, however, drawbacks to moving through school at such a brisk pace. For one, it deprives students of the luxury of time to roam (遨游) intellectually. Compressing everything into three years also leaves less time for growing up, engaging in extracurricular activities, and studying abroad. On crowded campuses it could mean fewer opportunities to get into a prized