III. After you read
1. Answer the following questions
1. What served as a springboard for higher education in the USA? What was the first university to emerge?
2. What is the essence of the innovations Thomas Jefferson brought about?
3. What shift occurred in the 19th century?
4. What events in the 20th century became a turning point in the development of higher education in the USA?
2. Do the multiple choice test going behind some words in the text
1. The term “higher education” refers to
a. high school
b. colleges and universities
2. The word minister in the 1st paragraph is close in its meaning to
a. politician
b. priest
3. The noun Puritan is derived from the adjective pure, synonymous to the adjective
a. religious
b. immaculate
4. The verb to feature in the 3d paragraph is closer in its meaning to the verb
a. to include
b. to perform
5. The word vocational is connected with
a. holydays
b. profession
6. The word tuition in the 5th paragraph means
a. the money you pay for being taught
b. teaching, especially in small groups
3. If you manage to read the message written clockwise, you will learn what education really means for the Americans.
A R N T H E M OR
E
E
U Y
O O
Y U
E L
R
O
MEH T N R A E
NB
4. Consider the following cultural note
THE IVY LEAGUE - eight long-established colleges and universities in the United States with prestigious academic and social reputations. Members of the Ivy League are Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island; Columbia University in New York City; Cornell University in Ithaca, New York; Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire; Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts; University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia; Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey; and Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. The name goes back to the English tradition to decorate the walls of the establishments with ivy.
THOMAS JEFFERSON (1743-1826) – the third president of the United States (1801-1809) and author of the Declaration of Independence. He was one of the most brilliant individuals in history. His interests were boundless, and his accomplishments were great and varied. He was a philosopher, educator, naturalist, politician, scientist, architect, inventor, pioneer in scientific farming, musician, and writer, and he was the foremost spokesman for democracy of his day.
He had great faith in popular rule, and it is this optimism that is the essence of what came to be called Jeffersonian democracy.
5 (a) Thomas Shepard was a minister in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1672 when his sixteen-year-old son was accepted into Harvard University. Read some counsels he gives his son in a letter.
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Advice on Attending Harvard
By Thomas Shepard, 1672
Look that you loose not your precious time by falling in with Idle Companions, or by growing weary of your studies, or by Love of any filthy lust; or by discouragement of heart that you shall never attain to any excellency of Knowledge, or by thinking too well of your self, that you have got as much as is needfull for you, when you have got as much as your Equals in the same year….
Get therefore into the acquaintance of some of your Equalls, to spend some time with them often in discoursing and disputing about the things you hear and read and learn; as also grow acquainted with some that are your Superiours, of whom you may often ask questions and from whom you may learn more than by your Equals only.
Choose rather to confess your Ignorance in any matter of Learning, that you may [be] instructed by your Tutor,(…) than to pass from it, and so continue in your Ignorance thereof….
Be sparing in your Diet, as to meat and drink, that so after any repast your body may be a servant to your mind, and not a Clog and Burden.
(b) Does this advice remain sound after 300 years? Think of the counsel you would give today a person entering higher education. Write your letter of advice and present it in class.
