韩国大元外国语高中只有二十几年的历史,但却是全国名列前茅的高中。该校100%的学生能升入韩国前三名的大学,每年有100多名学生升入哈佛大学、普林斯顿大学等美国常春藤名校。此种战绩让人羡慕不已……
Roughly 1,200 students at the private Daewon School begin their day with a nationally required1)curriculum of Korean, math, and English. Then, three afternoons a week, about a quarter of them continue their studies in the Global Leadership Program. The program emphasizes the research, writing, and analytical skills they’ll need at top U.S. colleges. Composition teacher Joseph Foster reminds his students to keep their writing focused.
在私立的大元高中,大约一千两百名学生以全国统一规定的必修课——语文、数字和英语开始其一天的生活。另外,每周有三个下午,大概有四分之一的学生会继续他们“全球领袖培训计划”的学习。这种培训着重训练他们在美国顶级大学用得上的研究、写作和分析能力。写作老师约瑟夫·福斯特在提醒学生在写作时要有重点。
Joseph: Last thing, 2)clutter and unnecessary fluff.
约瑟夫:最后一点,要避免杂乱无章,言之无物。
Before, Koreans hoping to get into U.S. colleges would usually start out at an American prep school. Now, some go directly from a handful of elite Korean schools, including Daewon. Most of them are the children of affluent, globe-3)trotting Korean professionals. Song You-jin, for example, is planning to apply early decision to Yale to study political science.
在以前,如果韩国人想考进美国大学,他们通常都会以美国预科学校为起点;而如今,有些学生直接从极少数几所顶尖的韩国学校进入美国大学,而大元高中就是其中之一。这里的大部分学生都是有钱人或者是满世界跑的韩国专业人士的子弟。比如说,正准备申请耶鲁大学政治学专业提前录取的宋佑堇(音译)。
Song You-jin: I was always set on going to university in the United States because my dad graduated Wharton and he was a professor at Columbia, so I thought the schools are really great there. Then, when I was in middle school, we came back to Korea and I became interested in English debate. And Daewon has the best debate team in Korea. So I was really interested in that part.
宋佑堇:我一直都想着要到美国去上大学,因为我爸是从沃顿商学院毕业的,又曾在哥伦比亚大学教书,所以我觉得那里的学校很好。在我念中学的时候我们全家回到了韩国。后来我对英语辩论产生了兴趣,而大元高中的英语辩论队伍是全国最棒的。因此我对这一点特别感兴趣。
Students line up for a dinner of fish, eggs, fried rice, and plum tea. Global Leadership Program students finish 4)study hall at 7:30 p.m. It used to end at 11 p.m. Senior Hwang Jae-kyun takes Spanish and Chinese in addition to English and Korean. He says he’s finally adapted to the 5)grueling schedule.
学生排队吃晚餐,吃的是鱼、蛋、炒饭和李茶。“全球领袖培训计划”的学生在晚上七点半就结束自习,但他们以前常常会呆到晚上十一点。毕业班学生黄在坤(音译)除了修读英语和韩语课外,他还选修了西班牙语和汉语。他说终于适应了学校紧张的作息时间。
Hwang Jae-kyun: Well, honestly speaking, during my first and second years, you know, I was suffering from sleep 6)deprivation almost every day, because there was just a lot of homework and, you know, I had to stay up until like maybe 3 a.m. in the morning. And then I’d try to stay up during classes, you know, the next day, but sometimes I’d just like fall asleep during class, too. But that doesn’t happen that often.
黄在坤:嗯,说实话,在头两年,你知道吗,我几乎每天都睡得很少,因为功课太多了。我每天都得到凌晨三点左右才能睡,你知道。第二天我要努力让自己在课堂上不睡着,但有时候我还是会上课时睡着。不过这种事现在出现不太多。
Hwang’s efforts have helped him get 1,570 out of 1,600 on his SATs, and perfect scores on all five of his advanced placement tests.
黄在坤的努力帮助他在满分为1600分的学习能力评估训练考试中考出了1570分的高分,而且在所有五门大学预修课的考试成绩都很不错。
Daewon’s college counselor, Eric Cho, runs down the list of admissions for this year’s graduating class—two at Harvard, seven at Cornell, five at Stanford, and so on. But Cho says that grinding competition for elite jobs and even marriages produces a Korean fixation on famous-named schools. He says that getting families to settle for excellent non-Ivy League institutions is a big challenge.
大元高中的大学顾问埃里克·赵正在看今年毕业班升学的名单:哈佛两人、康奈尔七人、斯坦福五人,等等。但他说高端职业,甚至是择偶方面的残酷竞争现实导致韩国人对名牌大学产生了一种执著。他表示,让韩国家庭接受一些优秀,但并不属于常春藤学校的大学是一件很困难的事。
Eric: We have a very high number of students who go to good schools that are not so famous, for instance, Harvey Mudd College. We have dozens of students at Swarthmore College, Amherst, Williams, a student going to Pomona College. Lots of great schools that are not household names in Korea.
埃里克:我们有许多学生去了一些很优秀但不是那么出名的学校,比如说哈维穆德学院。我们有好几十个学生在斯沃斯莫尔学院、艾姆赫斯特学院、威廉姆斯学院就读;有一名学生在波莫纳学院就读。有许多好的学校,它们的名字在韩国并不是家喻户晓。
According to the New York-based Institute of International Education, the number of South Korean students at U.S. colleges and universities jumped by 11% last year to nearly 70,000. Only India and China send more, and they have far larger populations. And of course, American schools would probably not be snapping up Daewon’s graduates if they thought they were just 7)bland bookworms and cookie-cutter hyper-achievers.
根据总部在纽约的国际教育机构的数据显示,在美国大学学习的韩国学生数量在去年增长了11%,接近七万人。只有来自印度和中国的留学生人数比韩国的多,但这两个国家的人口比韩国多得多。当然,如果美国的大学认为大元高中的学生只不过是毫无生气的书呆子和毫无特色的高材生,估计他们也不会随随便便就录取的。
Joseph: This is one of the narratives about students like our students, that they’re just mechanical study machines, and I can’t tell you how wrong that is. Working here, I find—OK, these kids study a lot, they work hard, they’re super disciplined. But any chance they have to be creative, they jump at it.
约瑟夫:这确实是对我们这些学生的评价之一,说他们只不过是学习机器。而我要说的是,这种看法错得太离谱了。在这里工作,我发现——是的,这些孩子在学习上花很多时间,也很刻苦,他们的纪律性非常强。但一旦有让他们发挥创造力的机会,他们绝不会放过。
After classes, members of the 8)extracurricular 9)Samul nori Club pound away their stress with a traditional Korean percussion jam. Students here are happy to say they still 10)eke out time for hobbies and community service. And Eric Cho points out that while making out in the hallways would not be appropriate, there’s no ban on students dating each other.
课后,课外传统四物打击乐俱乐部成员以韩国传统的打击乐驱散学习压力。在这里读书的学生会很乐意说他们还能够挤出时间满足自己的爱好和为社区服务。埃里克·赵说,男女学生在走廊里亲热被视为不正当的行为,但学校并不禁止男女学生之间的约会。
