Ques:This summer, Monika Lutz's life took an unusual turn. Instead of heading off to college, the high school graduate packed her bags for a Bengali jungle. Lutz, like a growing number of other young Americans, is taking a year off. Gap  years  are quite common in Britain and Australia, but they are just beginning to catch on in the U.S. Lutz, who grew up in Boulder, Colo., has put together a 14-month schedule that includes helping deliver solar power to some communities in India and interning   for a fashion designer in Shanghai---experiences that are worlds away from the lecture halls and university dormitories that await other students. "I could not be happier," she says. Why are students attracted to the gap-year concept? According to new survey data from Karl Haigler and Rae Nelson, education-policy experts and co-authors of The Gap-Year Advantage, the most common reason for this is to avoid burnout. "I felt like I was focused on college as a means to an end," says Kelsi Morgan, an incoming Middlebury College freshman who spent last year interning for a judge in Tulsa, Okla., and teaching English at an orphanage in the Dominican Republic. The hope is that after a year out of the classroom, students will enter college more energized, focused and mature. That can be an advantage for colleges too. Robert Clagett, dean of admissions at Middlebury, did some research a few years ago and found that a single gap semester was the strongest predictor of academic success at his school. Most experts recommend securing a spot in college before taking a gap year and warn against using the time off to lengthen your resume. "Most admissions folks can see right through that," says Jim Jump, the academic dean of St. Christopher's School in Richmond, Va. But for students like Lutz, who, after getting rejected from five Ivies, decided to take time off, a gap year can help focus interests. Lutz now plans to apply mostly to non-Ivies that have strong marketing programs. "This experience has really opened my eyes to the... Stefanie DeLuca probably agrees that   _  . A) students should think twice before taking gap years B) taking gap years enables students to achieve success C) schools should encourage their students to take gap years D) taking gap years increases students' chances of getting a good job

Ans:A
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Ques:Are you having difficulty falling asleep? Try drinking a glass of warm milk. If that doesn't work, listen to some soft, beautiful music. Still no luck? Try think about sheep jumping over a fence. If you are still awake, take a sleeping pill. People who take pills often become dependent on the drugs. So you lie awake knowing that the new workday will soon arrive. If you have been in such condition for at least one month, you may have primary insomnia . A new study has found that you might fall asleep more quickly and stay asleep longer if you try "cerebral hypothermia." It is not a complex medical process. It just means cooling down your brain. Eric Nofzinger and Naniel Buysse from the University of Pittsburgh Medical School led the study. They examined twelve people who had sleeping problems. Twelve others had no sleeping problems. Each of them wore a soft plastic cap on their head at bedtime. The caps had tubes inside filled with water. The researchers moved the water through the tubes and then changed the temperature of the water. Other studies showed that people who had sleeping problems often had more chemical reactions in the front of their brain. The researchers thought cooling down the brain might help. On the first two nights of testing, the patients wore caps with no water. On the next two nights, the caps were worn, but the water was not cooled. Then the researchers cooled the water a little for another two nights. On the final two nights of the study, the temperature of the water was made much cooler. The researchers found that the water caps didn' t help the patients until the temperature was about 14degC. Most of the patients fell asleep faster and slept better when the coolest water was moving around their head.  Dr Nfzinger and Dr. Buysse noted that this was only the beginning of the brain temperature study. But they believed they had discovered something important that needed more research. In the study, researchers helped people fall asleep faster through   _  . A) increasing chemical reactions in the front of their brain. B) making them feel safe with a cap on their head C) lowering the temperature of their brain D) asking them to drink water to cool down

Ans:C
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Ques:San Francisco's Chinatown is the biggest and oldest in the country. It's the third most visited tourist destination in the city. It's also the city's most densely populated neighbor- hood. So why are. businesses in Chinatown struggling? In this week's paper, I outline some of the reasons for why Chinatown's crowded streets and busy shops might be declining. Underneath the surface, Chinatown is falling. And the city, local organizations and businesses are trying to figure out what they can do to turn things around. While numbers of people visit Chinatown, they don't stay long and they don't spend a lot of money.  And beyond annual festivals,1ike Chinese New Years,  this month's Moon Festival and last month's Sunday Streets - which drew about 15,000 t0 20.000 people - the neighborhood has a hard time attracting locals. Can you remember the last. time you went to Chinatown ?If you can't, You're not alone. Locals told me that Chinatown doesn't have much to offer them - that the stores are all the same. There are some good eating joints, people said, but they don't know how to find them. Some people even told me that they sometimes go to extreme measures to avoid the neighborhood altogether. But when asked if the-v would like to see Chinatown gone, the answer was always a strong no. Locals are hopeful that things will get better and traffic will increase when the Central Subway is complete. But chat's not for another five years. at least. And if' new shops or restaurants don't make their way into Chinatown. the same problem of attracting locals will exist. Not that Chinatown's going to die. The dragon still has some fire in its belly. And many people are rooting for positive change. The question is, how does Chinatown change without losing the very importance of what makes it unique? It can be inferred from the passage    _   . A) the Central Subway is under construction B) Chinatown has to make way for subway C) many restaurants have been closed down D) the locals hope Chinatown will be extinct

Ans:
A
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