The Big Cram for Hunter High School

[김성봉영어평생교육원]

The Big Cram for Hunter High School.hwp

※ 본 내용은 The New York Times의 기사로 강의용으로 사용될 것이므로 번역문은 탑재하지 않았음을 알려드립니다.

The Big Cram¹⁾ for Hunter High School

By JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ - The New York Times

Published: January 2, 2009

While their friends played video games in pajamas or vacationed in the tropics, a dozen

sixth  graders spent winter break at Elite Academy in Flushing, Queens, memorizing word

roots. Time was ticking as they prepared to face the thing they had talked about, dreamed

about and  lost sleep over for much of the past year: the Hunter College High School

admissions exam, a strenuous²⁾ three-hour test that weeds³⁾ out about 90 percent of

those who take it.

On Wednesday, the final day of test-prep boot camp⁴⁾ before the Jan. 9 exam, there

seemed to be nothing more terrifying to these 11-year-olds than the risk of failure.

Some had taken up coffee; others, crossword puzzles and cable news shows to glean⁵⁾

vocabulary words. A few of their parents had hired private tutors and imposed strict

study hours, and several had paid up to $3,000 for a few months of English and math

classes at Elite, a regimen⁶⁾ modeled on the cram schools of South Korea, China and

Japan.

The five girls and seven boys at Elite on Wednesday seemed to delight in their onerous⁷⁾

routine⁸⁾, unwilling or unable to imagine life any other way.

“My friends think it’s wacko⁹⁾ to do so much preparation,” said Akira Taniguchi, an

aspiring F.B.I. agent who attends the honors program at Junior High School 54 on the

Upper  West Side.

“But now I feel I’m really focused, thanks to this academy, and way more confident

than I was when I first came here.”

Patryk Wadolowski, the brown-haired, blue-eyed president of his sixth-grade class at

Public School 58, chimed¹⁰⁾ in: “It just prepares us for life. Any obstacle we face we’ll

be able to conquer.”

In a classroom decorated with maps and illustrations of vocabulary words (a string of

z’s for “dormant,” a serene¹¹⁾ plateau¹²⁾ for “salubrious¹³⁾”), the squad of high-

achievers spent 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. dissecting English and math questions. As they

progressed from sentence completion to reading comprehension, nearly every question

posed by the teacher, Elisabeth Stuveras, elicited a garden of eager hands.

The puzzle of the moment was the word “resentment.” Some students had been

stumped¹⁴⁾ by it on the practice test, and Ms. Stuveras asked if anyone could offer a

definition.

“Like, you resent having a fight with people?” Patryk hypothesized.

No, that was “regret,” Ms. Stuveras explained. She searched for an example that might

ring true for the students.

“Pretend your friends are applying to Hunter,” she said. “There’s a chance that the

person who didn’t get in might feel a little resentment they didn’t get in. They are upset

the other people got in, with a little jealousy.”

“ ‘Resent’ is a good word to add to your vocabulary,” Ms. Stuveras concluded. The

students nodded in understanding, highlighting the word in unison.

At 1:15, they took a break, throwing aside lofty vocabulary to chat around the vending

machines  about their favorite rappers (Jay-Z and Kanye West) and coming school

dances.

When prompted, they took a moment to reflect on why they wanted to get into Hunter.

Some said it was an urge to become better students and be surrounded by bright peers;

others said they had been told Hunter was a vital steppingstone¹⁵⁾ to elite colleges and

a successful career.

“Ever since I was in second grade, I always wanted to go to Hunter,” Patryk said. “I’ve

always strived to achieve everything in every test.”

Most of the students came to the five-day winter break program at Elite after attending

Saturday prep classes at the academy through the fall. Elite, which opened in 1986, is

one of several cram schools in New York that has imported the year-round enrichment

programs of the Far East, giving students the chance to forfeit¹⁶⁾ evenings, weekends,

summer break and   winter vacation for test preparation.

While Elite limits advertising to Asian-language newspapers, about 50 percent of its

students are non-Asian. (Asian students still predominate¹⁷⁾ in the city’s top public high

schools, including Hunter.)

Many of the students in the winter break program were children of immigrants - from

South Korea, Japan, Poland - and most attend city schools. Few things are kept private.

Scores on practice tests are posted in the front lobby, and students freely share their

homework scores and edit each other’s essays. It is the first time many of them have

received letter grades on assignments.

When it was time to hand back essays, Ms. Stuveras announced that four students had

earned high-passes. “Ah, yes!” Patryk exclaimed.

Did anyone fail? “Well, yes,” Ms. Stuveras explained. “You guys did pretty well, though;

there were a lot of high-fails.”

Joanna Cohen, a student at the School at Columbia University who peppers her

sentences with words like “amiable” and “headway” and spits out math formulas faster

than the teacher can write on the board, sipped on mint tea at her desk (most of her

classmates preferred Pepsi or  Mountain Dew). She smiled as she looked at her high

score on the practice exam.

After class, she passed around her blue grammar book and asked some classmates to

write their phone numbers in the front.

Outside, in the lobby, the students exchanged study tactics and traded

recommendations on dictionaries and vocabulary books. (Joanna recommends

“Webster’s.”)

A few said they were going to devote their free time to the thesaurus, looking for

ways to spruce¹⁸⁾ up ho-hum¹⁹⁾ sentences. (“Our teacher said using high-level

vocab will increase your chance of passing,” Akira explained.)

And what if they were not among the fewer than 200 students who gain seats out

of a pool of up to 2,000 test-takers?

“I’ll be sad,” said James Lee, a student at Intermediate School 119 in Glendale,

Queens, “but there’s still Stuyvesant.”

-----------------

  1) cram [kræm] <v.a.n.> 억지로 채워 넣다, 다져넣다, 배가 터  지도록 먹이다

(overfeed), 주입식 공부를 시키다

    ●  cram(ming) school 학원, (주입식 교육을 하는) 수험 준비학교

 2) strenuous [str nju s] <a.> 분투적인, 격렬한, 불요불굴(不搖不屈)의, 힘든

(arduous, backbreaking)

 3) weed [wi:d] <n.v.> (잡초를, 풀을) 없애다, 제거하다 <O.E. weod 'plant not

valued for use or  beauty'>

 4) boot [bu:t] <n.v.> (pl.) 장화, 신병, 구둣발로 차기, 파면, 해고 ?  boot camp

(미국 해군) 신병 훈련소

 5) glean [gli:n] <v.> (이삭) 줍다, (사실, 정보) 수집하다, (책, 단어) 하나씩 하나씩

조사하다, 찾아내다

 6) regimen [r d m n,-m n] <n.> 지배, 통치, 전치사의 목적어, 섭생/양생법/식이

요법

 7) onerous [ n r s] <a.> 번거로운, 힘든, 귀찮은, 성가신, (법률) 의무부담이 붙은

 8) routine [ru t n] <n.a.> 판에 박힌, 일상적(日常的)인

 9) wack [wæk] <n.> 괴짜, 기인

   wacko [w kou], wacky [w ki] <a.n.> 괴짜, 이상한/괴팍스러운/엉뚱한 녀석

10) chime [t aim] <n.> (조율을 한) 한 벌의 종, (문, 시계, 라디오) 차임/시보(時報),

조화, 일치

   ●  chime in 맞장구치다, (사람, 계획) 찬성하다(with), (동의하면서) 끼어들다  

11) serene [s r n] <a.n.v.> 맑게 갠, 청명한, 화창한, 구름 한 점 없는

12) plateau [pl t u, -́-] <n.> <F.> 고원, 대지(臺地), (위가 평평한) 여자용 모자,

큰 접시, 쟁반

13) salubrious [s l bri s] <a.> (기후, 토지) 건강에 좋은, 상쾌한, (정신적) 유익한

14) stump [st mp] <n.v.> <v.> 베다, 뿌리 뽑다, (질문) 쩔쩔매게 하다, 난처하게 하다

15) stepping-stone [st pi st un] <n.> 디딤돌, 징검돌, (출세를 위한) 수단, 방법, 발판

16) forfeit [f fit] <vt.> 상실하다, 빼앗다, 몰수하다 <n.a.> 벌금, 과료(fine), 추징금, (권리, 명예)

상실, 박탈

17) predominate [prid m n it] <v.> 우뚝 솟다, 지배하다, 우세하다, 두드러지다

18) spruce [spru:s] <n.a.> 말쑥한, 멋진, 맵시 있는, 스마트한 <v.> 말쑥하게/ 맵시 있게 하다,

모양내다

19) ho-hum [h uh m] <int.> 권태, 피로, 지루함, 하품 등의 소리 <a.> 흥미 없는, 시시한

-----------------