1 . While some say school safety depends on guns, cameras or alarms in classrooms, Mark Gomer and Kristi Schiller think specially trained dogs should play an important role in preventing violence in schools.
Gomer’s for-profit company has sent a gun-and-drug detecting dog to patrol (巡查) the halls of an Ohio high school, while Schiller is launching a nonprofit program in Houston to give schools the trained dogs for free.
Gomer’s first full-time safety dog is a three-year-old Dutch shepherd named Atticus, who is reported to duty this school year at Oak Hills High School in Green Township in southwest Ohio. The dog was trained at the school before the summer break, said Gomer, co-owner of American Success Dog Training in Bridgetown, Ohio. Atticus has won over students, parents, teachers and district Superintendent Todd Yohey, who initially worried what people would think of him spending $10,000 on a dog. Gomer has talked to a lot of parents and faculty, and they are saying it was money well-spent, he said.
For her part Schiller is looking to provide safety dogs to schools free of charge. She hopes her new initiative, program “K9S4KIDS”, does for schools what her program “K9S4COPS” did for police departments. She has placed more than 60 dogs with agencies in three years. “These dogs are extremely social, yet highly qualified warriors that are accustomed to going straight to the source of a threat or shooter and disengaging the suspect armed with the weapon,” said Schiller.
As the programs get up and running, questions remain about possible health problems and distractions the dogs can cause.
A school safety expert said those are concerns parents and schools will have to work out. Ken Trump, president of the Cleveland-based National School Safety and Security Services consulting firm, discussed the issue in general because he was not familiar with either program.
He said the dogs would have to be extremely social to deal with students’ initial excitement “Kids are going to like those dogs,” Trump said, “There are concerns to work around, but with the right dogs and right handler and the right policies and procedures, they should be very beneficial. The dog might be a distraction in the beginning, but they will become part of what students expect to see when they go to school.” “There is so much these dogs can do,” said Ted Dahlin, a deputy who serves on the K9S4COPS board of directors. “If I were going to pick a school to make trouble, it would be one that I knew didn’t have a dog.”
1. Which of the following statements is TRUE about Gomer’s program?| A．Atticus is only welcomed by students. |
| B．Atticus is provided to the schools free of charge. |
| C．The main job of Atticus is to patrol a school in Houston. |
| D．Parents and faculty think the money spent on Atticus is worthwhile. |
| A．dogs have a sharp sense of threat and danger |
| B．she is confident that the dogs are helpful in schools |
| C．dogs are a kind of helpful, loyal and qualified animal |
| D．even suspects armed with weapons are afraid of dogs |
| A．believes that dogs can be part of students’ school life |
| B．is a school safety expert supporting one of the programs |
| C．doesn’t approve of students’ attitudes about dogs in schools |
| D．agrees that the concerns outweigh the benefits of the program |
| A．he is not going to make trouble in schools |
| B．having a dog strengthens a school’s safety |
| C．he likes dogs and really wants to have one |
| D．more should be considered for planning a crime |
2 . Crazy Laws
It seems that the Greek philosopher, Aristotle, was right when he said, “Even when laws have been written down, they ought not always to remain unaltered.”
Did you know, for example, that London taxis (officially called Hackney carriages) are still legally required to carry hay and oats for their horses to eat? And in England, it is illegal to stand within 100 yards (91 metres) of the queen, without wearing socks?
If you live in Scotland, however, it’s important to know that if someone knocks at the door of your house, and needs to use your toilet, you are legally required to let him in.
Lots of the craziest laws seem to involve animals.
Last, children are forbidden from going to school with their breath smelling of wild onions in West Virginia. And in Arkansas, teachers who have a certain hairc ut (a bob) will not be given a pay-rise. In Florida, a woman can be fined for falling asleep under the hair-dryer and unmarried women must not parachute on a Sunday. If they do, they might be arrested, receive a fine or be put in jail.
| A．But if you are Scottish you should stay away from the city of York. |
| B．Never should a Scotsman leave his own country. |
| C．But strange laws don’t just exist in the UK. |
| D．England is the place where craziest laws have been in existence for centuries. |
| E．Laws in some parts of the world haven’t changed for centuries. |
| F．In Hollywood, it is illegal to take more than 2,000 sheep down Hollywood Boulevard at any one time. |
3 . When Carolina Escudero was severely depressed, going to a therapist’s office became hard to face. So she joined BetterHelp, a popular therapy app. She paid $65 each week but spent most of her time waiting for her assigned counsellor to respond. She got two responses in a month.“It was like texting an acquaintance who has no idea how to deal with mental illness,” she says. BetterHelp says its service does not claim to operate around the clock, all its therapists have advanced degrees and “thousands of hours of hands-on clinical work”, and users are able easily to switch them if scheduling is hard.
Helping people to deal with mental problems has rarely been more urgent. The incidence of depression and anxiety has soared in the pandemic by more than 25% globally in 2020, according to the Lancet, a medical journal. That, combined with more people using online services, has led to a boom in mental-health apps. The American Psychological Association reckons 10,000-20,000 are available for download.
Underneath, though, a trauma lies in some corners of the industry. In October 2020 hackers who had breached Vastaamo, a popular Finnish startup, began blackmailing some of its users. Vastaamo required therapists to back up patient notes online but reportedly did not anonymize (匿名) them. Threatening to share private information on the dark web, the hackers reportedly demanded money from some 30,000 patients.
Other cases may arise. No universal standards for storing “emotional data” exist. John Torous of Harvard Medical School, who has reviewed 650 mental- health apps, describes their privacy policies as terrible. Some share information with advertisers. “When I first joined BetterHelp, I started to see targeted ads with words that I had used on the app to describe my personal experiences,” reports one user.
As for effectiveness, the apps’ methods are exceedingly difficult to evaluate. Woebot, for instance, is a chat robot which uses artificial intelligence to reproduce the experience of cognitive behavioural therapy. The product is marketed as clinically validated based in part on a scientific study which concluded that humans can form meaningful bonds with robots. But the study was written by people with financial links to Woebot.
Mental-health apps were designed to be used in addition to clinical care, not in the place of them. With that in mind, the European Commission is reviewing the field. It is getting ready to promote a new standard that will apply to all health apps. A letter-based scale will rank safety, user friendliness and data security. Liz Ashall-Payne, founder of ORCHA, a British startup that has reviewed thousands of apps, says that 68% did not meet the firm’s quality criteria. Time to head back to the couch?
1. What can we learn about Betterhelp?| A．Betterhelp is highly responsive to users' needs. |
| B．Betterhelp provides around-the-clock service. |
| C．Betterhelp is an app helping people deal with mental problems. |
| D．Betterhelp is trustworthy in terms of protecting users’ privacy. |
①The increasing awareness of one’s physical and mental health.
②The soaring incidence of mental problems during the pandemic.
③The widespread use of online services.
④The universal standards in quality evaluation.
| A．①② | B．②③ | C．③④ | D．①④ |
| A．To illustrate to readers what kind of product Woebot is. |
| B．To inform readers that Woebot is clinically validated. |
| C．To show how artificial intelligence is used in health apps. |
| D．To prove how difficult it is to evaluate the effectiveness of health apps. |
| A．Optimistic. | B．Indifferent. | C．Doubtful. | D．Negative. |
4 . He’s considered the father of the technological innovation, and apart from that, he was also known as a design perfectionist. There is no single executive or creator in the technology industry who is more creative and inspirational than him, and with that being said he was a one-in-billion creator.
On February 24, 1955, in San Francisco, California, United States, a baby named Steve Jobs entered the world. His parents’ inability to provide for him led to a difficult childhood, one in which he battled with his sense of self and felt constantly confused and unfulfilled. Nonetheless, who could have predicted that this person would cause such a dramatic shift in the information technology? The way Steve Jobs showed the world the new products and devices he was working on was truly out of this world, and that’s a big part of why he’s so beloved.
Steve Jobs was well-informed, but he was not a scholar. He possessed a high IQ but showed little enthusiasm for formal education. His main hobbies were playing tricks on people via phone and computer, goofing off with his best friends, and coming up with ground-breaking business concepts.
Steve Jobs’ philosophy on education is well-known at this point; he has stated publicly that he was only able to learn after leaving college. When Steve Jobs and his friend Wozniak were in their early 20s, they came up with the idea for the Apple Computer. Steve Jobs’ Volkswagen bus and Wozniak’s beloved scientific calculator were sold to finance the pair’s garage-based startup. Jobs and Wozniak have been given much of credit for democratizing the computer industry by making computers more user-friendly, portable, and affordable.
Wozniak envisioned a line of accessible and lightning-fast personal computers, and Jobs was put in charge of the company’s marketing and management. From the get-go, Apple sold the computers for up to $666. The unexpected greatness of their early success inspired them to develop more powerful machines. In the 70s, they accomplished what would become the company’s crowning achievement. Assembled by Apple, Inc. , the high-performance computer was an instant success in their home state of California, and its sales helped make Jobs a multimillionaire.
1. Which of the following is a big reason for Jobs being beloved?| A．Jobs revolutionized the technology industry. |
| B．Jobs realized his dream despite his painful childhood. |
| C．Jobs employed an extraordinary way to present the new devices. |
| D．Jobs is the most creative and motivational person in the technology industry. |
| A．quitting school | B．playing around |
| C．starting a business | D．learning knowledge |
| A．Jobs is keen on keeping in contact with friends via phone and computer. |
| B．Jobs and Wozniak advocated democracy for every staff in the computer industry. |
| C．Jobs showed less passion for education because of the influence of his difficult childhood. |
| D．The economic situation was a barrier to Jobs and Wozniak when they started their business. |
| A．All things come to those who always choose to wait. |
| B．The only thing that keeps you going is that you love what you do. |
| C．Knowledge makes you humble, while ignorance makes you proud. |
| D．If you look at what you have in your life, you will always have more. |
5 .
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| To: inquiry@businessaudiopro.com |
| From: j.annesly@anneslydata.com |
| Date: June 25 |
| Subject: Request |
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1. From what is mentioned above, we can learn that Business Audio Pro.
| A．is always ready to answer customers’ phone calls |
| B．has its professional services advertised in the newspaper |
| C．provides voice samples and estimated prices on its website |
| D．fills orders in three days’time to meet customers’ specific needs |
① Professional voice talent ② On-hold messages
③ Customized script writing ④ Multilingual Voice production
| A．①②③ | B．②③④ | C．①②④ | D．①③④ |
| A．A business owner. | B．A data collector. |
| C．A sales assistant. | D．A customer service specialist. |
6 .
Wonders of Australia 22 days from only £6.245 per person
Days 2-5: Singapore Enjoy a city tour including Merlion Park, Marina Bay, and fabulous gardens. As an alternative, you may choose to stop in Dubai at no extra cost. Days 6-11: Melbourne Visit Victoria Markets and Federation Square. Perhaps take an optional excursion to explore Fairy Penguin Parade. Day 12-14: The Ghan Experience one of the world’s most impressive rail journeys. Covering 1,555 kilometres, we see the everchanging landscape as we journey north. Enjoy all inclusive Gold Service with on board meals included as are a wide selection of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Day 15-17: Uluru (Ayers Rock) We enjoy a refreshing glass of sparkling wine and witness the changing colours as the sun sets. There is a chance to explore the rock in the morning, before visiting the impressive Olgas.
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| A．Cairns and the Ghan |
| B．Uluru and Melbourne |
| C．Melbourne and the Ghan |
| D．Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef |
| A．You may be charged an extra £349 in total for daily breakfasts. |
| B．You will enjoy a day trip to Daintree Rainforest, a world heritage. |
| C．You may choose to stop in both Singapore and Dubai at no extra cost. |
| D．You will be offered a meal with drinks when heading north by train in the Ghan. |
| A．£17,791 | B．£18,822 | C．£18,841 | D．£19,572 |
7 . A new technique to work out a corpse’s time of death
In fiction, forensic (法医的) experts presented with a corpse are able to take a bite of their sandwich and instantly pronounce a time of death. Reality is, of course, a lot messier, and the results--or lack of them—can make or break a case.
Now artificial intelligence is offering a helping hand. By analyzing thousands of deaths and what follows, the technology can offer the best estimates so far of PMI, Post-Mortem Interval (尸体死后间隔).
Forensis-science journals are full of such cases while the potentially useful details of thousands more investigations are buried in case files around the world.
Developed by a research team led by Katherine Weisensee at Clemson University in South Carolina, the model is based on data pooled from more than 2,500 death investigations, with more added each week. About 1,800 of these are real-world cases involving the discovery of a body.
The results could be used to check alibis and help solve crimes, but they have other uses too. Madeline Atwell, a forensic anthropologist at Clemson University who works on the project, says the model has already helped close several missing-person cases.
| A．With more cases and examples added to the database, the results will be more reliable. |
| B．Entering the location allows the AI model to take local weather conditions into consideration. |
| C．The rest are drawn from forensic experiments at so-called “body farms” in Texas and Tennessee. |
| D．Combining time of death with when people were last seen alive is very useful in identifying human remains. |
| E．Working out when a person has died is the most basic but frustratingly imprecise part of a forensic investigator’s work. |
| F．Now forensic researchers in America are working to collect and access these valuable papers, and to use machine learning to analyze them. |
8 . On average, cars sit, doing nothing, 96 percent of the time. That makes them ideal candidates for the sharing economy. The potential to reduce traffic jams is enormous. A handful of car-sharing systems are already having a major impact on the total number of vehicles in our cities. Scholars have estimated that every shared vehicle removes nine to 13 privately owned cars from the streets.
The benefits will grow greatly as autonomous vehicles, that is, self-driving cars, currently available in experimental forms, gain a notable portion of the market. “Your” car could give you a lift to work in the morning and then, rather than sitting in a parking lot, give a lift to someone else in your family—or to anyone else in your neighborhood or social media community.
As a result, a single vehicle could go from one to 24 hours of use a day. A recent paper by our colleagues at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology report s that, under such conditions, the mobility demand of a city like Singapore could be met with only 30 percent of its existing vehicles. In addition to vehicle sharing, autonomy could open up a new wave of ride sharing. Already applications such as Via, uberPOOL and Lyft Line allow different people to share the same ride, cutting operating costs and individual fares. Autonomy could boost ride sharing even more because all trips could be managed online. In cities, the potential for ride sharing is significant, based on analyses by our Sense able City Lab at M. IT.
New York City, for example, is obviously shareable. Our lab’s HubCab project gathered data from 170 million taxi trips involving 13,500 taxis in the city—specifically, the GPS coordinates (协调) for all pickup and drop-off points and corresponding times between the two. We then developed a mathematical model to determine the potential effect of ride sharing applied to those journeys. The project introduced the concept quantitative results revealed how taxi sharing could reduce the number of cars by 40 percent with only rainimal delays for passengers.
Combine car sharing and ride sharing, and a city might get by with just 20 percent the number of cars now in use, with its residents traveling on-demand. Of course, such reductions are theoretical. In real life, they would depend on how willing people are to share rides and adopt self-driving technology. But any drop in the number of vehicles could lower the costs and energy associated with building and maintaining our mobility infrastructure (基础建设). Fewer cars might also mean shorter travel times, fewer traffic jams and a smaller environmental impact.
1. What does the author imply in the first paragraph?| A．Car-sharing is still in its infancy. |
| B．Cars aren’t made full use of at present. |
| C．Privately-owned cars have decreased by 13%. |
| D．There have been fewer traffic jams in big cities. |
| A．They can reduce the mobility demand of big cities. |
| B．They will account for a large portion of the market. |
| C．They can make it convenient for people to share the same ride. |
| D．They will raise people’s awareness of environmental protection. |
| A．how trip-sharing has helped the city |
| B．how ride-sharing can be put into practice |
| C．why people are worried about taxi sharing |
| D．why mathematical models matter in making a city shareable |
| A．We should share not only cars but also rides. |
| B．People have no confidence in self-driving technology. |
| C．The estimated reductions of cars on streets are theoretically groundless. |
| D．Our mobility infrastructure cannot support the development of autonomy. |
9 . A postcard is a lovely way to share your thoughts and greetings with someone while you’re traveling of simply want to reach out and connect. Below is a detailed set of instructions outlining the process of composing a postcard:
(1) Select a postcard: Choose a postcard that represents the place you’re visiting or one that has a design that agrees with your message.
(2) Address the recipient: Start by writing the recipient’s name on the left side of the postcard. You can include their full name or just their first name, depending on your relationship with them.
(3) Add an opening greeting: Begin the message with a friendly greeting, such as “Dear”, “Hi”, or “Hello”. Use the recipient’s name if you have a close relationship with them.
(4) Write a concise message: Keep your message brief and focus on the highlights of your trip or the purpose of your communication. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Describe the sights and experiences: Share a few interesting details about the places you’ve visited, the activities you’ve enjoyed, or any unique experiences you’ve had.
Express your thoughts and feelings: Share your impressions, emotions, or reflections about the location, the people you’ve met, or the overall atmosphere.
Share a funny or memorable events: If something amusing or noteworthy happened during your trip, include it to make the postcard more engaging.
Extend warm wishes: Convey your best wishes or send greetings for a specific occasion like a birthday or holiday. Show the recipient that you’re thinking of them.
(5) Sign off: End your postcard with a closing remark and your name. You can use phrases like “Best regards”, “Warm wishes”, or “Thinking of you”. Remember to sign your name below the closing.
(6) Optional: Add a postscript (P. S.): If you have any additional thoughts, trivia, or recommendations, you can include a P. S. below your signature. It’s a great way to add a personal touch to your postcard.
Remember, the charm of a postcard lies in its simplicity and personal touch. Enjoy the process of writing and sharing your message, and let the recipient know they are in your thoughts wherever you may be.
1. The passage is mainly intended to ______.| A．tell readers how to write a postcard |
| B．comment on the value of postcards |
| C．give an example of a charming postcard |
| D．encourage readers to compose more postcards |
| A．A postscript. |
| B．A future plan. |
| C．What you like most about the trip. |
| D．What you regret in the trip. |
| A．It is recommended to sign off a postcard with your initials. |
| B．It should include the recipient’s full name in the opening greeting. |
| C．It is encouraged to choose a design that is in line with the message. |
| D．Adding a postscript is considered compulsory to provide additional details. |
10 . The first official tests of driverless cars were carried out in the UK today, as the country roars ahead with plans to become a world leader in driverless technology. The UK government is providing £19 million worth of funding for the Lutz Pathfinder prototype pod, designed and built by Coventry-based engineering firm RDM Group. Today’s tests were carried out with four driverless cars in four separate UK locations: Coventry, Greenwich, Milton Keynes and Bristol. It is an initiative that the government hopes will eventually result in safer and less-congested roads and keep the UK at the cutting edge of automotive technology.
David Cameron tweeted his satisfaction with the unveilings:
The vehicle works by the passenger selecting a programmed route on a touchpad, which the car then travels using radar, cameras, light detection and ultrasonic sensors.
But while the cars, some patriotically emblazoned with the Union Jack flag, may look impressive, the UK government will have to review its road regulations before the robot cars can be let loose on Britain’s highways.
The UK has signed the 1968 Vienna Convention on Road Traffic, which states that drivers “shall at all times control their vehicles.” Germany, Italy and France in particular are currently attempting to abolish the legislation.
While the UK government argues that there is no legislative barrier to testing the cars, it has come under pressure from motoring groups like the RAC to provide robust safety regulations, particularly concerning the question of who would be responsible in the instance of a car crash if a driverless vehicle’s computer failed.
Professor Stephen Glaister, director of the RAC Foundation said:“Alongside the high-tech innovation you need policy decisions on long-term, low-tech matters such as who takes responsibility if things go wrong. As and when these vehicles become common place there is likely to be a shift from personal to product liability and that is a whole new ball game for insurers and manufacturers.”
Other European countries could be quick to follow in the UK’s footsteps. The German transport minister said earlier this month that driverless cars would be a common sight on the country’s roads in the next few years, although it too will have to tighten up legal regulations first.
However, as governments grapple with complex laws and regulations, not everyone is convinced that these robot cars will be a welcome addition on European roads. A survey conducted by Uswitch found that 43% of UKadults do not trust driverless cars to ensure the safety of passengers, while 16% said they were“horrified”by the entire concept of not having a human at the helm.
1. According to the first two paragraphs, the motives for testing driverless cars do not include______.| A．road safety | B．fewer traffic-jams |
| C．advanced technology | D．good national image |
| A．build a specific road | B．select a certain route |
| C．adjust road regulations | D．launch specific satellites |
| A．laws and policy-decisions haven’t stated responsibilities clearly |
| B．the technology in others countries haven’t developed as well as the UK |
| C．most people would not like the idea of having no human control the car |
| D．the problem of how to prevent car crash hasn’t been solved |
| A．cars driven by human beings would be washed out gradually |
| B．insurers would not take responsibility of car crashes |
| C．automotive technology would make travelling safer and more convenient |
| D．guidance system in cars would be well developed and more intelligent |
