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HALAMAN JUDUL

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STATE POLYTECHNIC OF MADIUN

BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT
ENGLISH STUDY PROGRAM
2021
 An Introduction

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

A listener in Poland recently sent us an e-mail. Slawek Loboda writes: "There are
many American universities and (1) colleges that provide long distance education to the
world. The trouble is that each university says that it is the best. After an hour of searching
and reading what they have in their offer, one gets a (2) headache. You simply don't know
whom to (3) trust and what to choose."

Slawek goes on to say, "I have been listening to VOA for years and I would trust you if you
made an interesting program about American universities for (4) foreigners. Is there a
university that you could recommend?"

Well, choosing a school is an individual (5) decision. But we may be able to help inform that
decision.

Slawek's letter happened to come at just the right time. It gives us the perfect opening for not
just one program, but a series -- our (6) Foreign Student Series. We update the series every
two years to provide fresh information for anyone interested in higher education in America.

The United States has more than four thousand (7) colleges and universities to choose from.
They come in all sizes – from (8) a few hundred students to enough to populate a city. And
students may not even have to be in the United States to take classes. Some universities have
campuses in other (9) countries. And, as Slawek pointed out, many programs are (10)
offered over the Internet.

Over the coming weeks, we will talk all about the American system of higher education. Our
reports will take you inside some of the (11) nation's colleges and universities. We will (12)
explore programs of study and report on student life. We will talk about financial aid and
(13) employment, and about (14) admissions tests and English language (15) requirements.

We will also explain the process for becoming an international student in the (16) United
States. And we will talk about how the terrorist (17) attacks of September eleventh, two
thousand one, changed some of the rules.

Many of the subjects in our Foreign Student Series are (18) based on your questions and
suggestions. So keep them coming! Send e-mail to [email protected], or click on the
Contact Us link at voaspecialenglish.com. Or write to VOA Special English, Washington,
D.C., two zero two three seven U.S.A.

In case you miss any of the programs, our Foreign Student Series will be (19) archived at
voaspecialenglish.com.
And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. (20) I'm
Steve Ember.

College, University or Institute?

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

Americans use the term "college students" to mean students either in colleges or universities.
Not only that, Americans almost never say "(1) going off to university" or "when I was in
university." That sounds British. Instead, they say "(2) going off to college" and "when I was
in college."

College, university: what's the difference? We answer that this week in part three of our (3)
foreign students Series on American higher education.

Colleges and universities have many things in (4) common. Both offer (5) undergraduate
degrees in the arts and sciences, for example. And both can help prepare young people to (6)
earn a living.

But many colleges do not offer graduate studies. Another difference is that universities are
generally (7) bigger. They offer more programs and do more (8) research.

Another place of higher education, especially in technical areas, is an (9) institute, like the
(10) Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Yet even an institute of technology can offer a
wide choice of programs and activities. (11) M.I.T. says that seventy-five percent of (12)
freshmen come there with a strong interest and involvement in the arts.

Modern universities developed from those of Europe in the (13) Middle Ages. The word
"university" came from the Latin universitas, describing a group of people organized for a
common purpose.

"College" came from (14) collegium, a Latin word with a similar meaning. In England,
colleges were (15) formed to provide students with places to live. Usually each group was
studying the same thing. So college came to mean an area of study.

The first American universities divided their studies into a number of areas and called (16)
each one a college. This is still true.

A college can also be a part of a university. For example, Harvard College is the
undergraduate part of Harvard University.
Programs in higher learning can also be called schools, like a school of engineering or a
medical school within a college or university. You know, learning all these (17) terms is an
education in itself.

And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Our
reports are at voaspecialenglish.com.

We invite your questions for our Foreign Student Series. We cannot offer any personal advice
or (18) assistance. But we might be able to answer a general question during our series.

Be sure to tell us your name and where you are. Write to [email protected] or use the
Contact Us (19) link at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm (20) Steve Ember.

Teens , Television, and Depression

This is the VOA Special English Health Report.

A new study suggests that the more teenagers watch television, the more likely they are to
develop (1) depression as young adults. But the extent to which TV may or may not be to
blame is a question that the study leaves (2) unanswered.

The researchers used a national long-term survey of (3) adolescent health to investigate the
relationship between media use and depression. They based their findings on more than four
thousand adolescents who were not (4) depressed when the survey began in nineteen ninety-
five.

(5) As part of the survey, the young people were asked how many hours of television or
videos they watched daily. They were also (6) asked how often they played computer games
and listened to the radio.

Media use totaled (7) an average of five and one-half hours a day. More than two hours of
that was spent watching TV.

Seven years later, in two thousand two, more than seven percent of the young people had (8)
signs of depression. The average age at that time was twenty-one.

Brian Primack at the University of Pittsburgh medical school was the lead (9) author of the
new study. He says every extra hour of television (10) meant an eight percent increase in the
chances of developing signs of depression.
The (11) researchers say they did not find any such relationship with the use of other media
such as movies, video games or radio. But the study did find that young (12) men were more
likely than young (13) women to develop depression given the same amount of media use.

Doctor Primack says the study did not (14) explore if watching TV causes depression. But
one (15) possibility, He says, is that it may take time away from activities that could help
(16) prevent depression, like sports and socializing. It might also (17) interfere with sleep,
he says, and that could have an influence.

The study was just published in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

In December, the journal Social Indicators Research published a study of activities that help
lead to happy lives. (17) Sociologists from the University of Maryland (18) found that people
who describe themselves as happy spend less time watching television than unhappy people.
The study found that happy people are more likely to be socially active, to read, (19) attend
religious services and to vote.

And that's the VOA Special English Health Report, written by Caty Weaver. For (20)
archives of our reports, go to voaspecialenglish.com.

Public or Private?

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

Today, in week four of our (1) Foreign Student Series, we discuss differences between public
and private in American higher education.

A big difference (2) involves money. Public colleges and universities charge for an education
just like private schools. But state schools cost less because they get money from the states
that started them to educate local (3) citizens. As a result, out-of-state and international
students usually pay more than state residents, at least the first year.

The state with the most (4) residents, almost forty million, is California. Its systems of two-
year and four-year colleges and universities are among the largest in the world.

But the example we are going to focus on today is to the north of California, in a much
smaller state on the West Coast: Oregon.

The University of Oregon, located in Eugene, is one of the campuses in the Oregon
University System. The cost for undergraduates this year is six thousand dollars for state
residents. Housing is an additional eight thousand. Nonresidents pay the same for housing --
but almost twenty thousand dollars for (5) tuition and fees.

Let's see how these numbers (6) compare to a private college in Oregon.

Lewis and Clark College in Portland has four thousand students, compared to twenty
thousand at the University of Oregon. Housing (7) costs eight hundred dollars more than at
the state school. But the big difference is tuition. The published price at Lewis and Clark is
almost thirty-four thousand dollars.

Yet Lewis and Clark is one of the few American colleges to offer financial aid for
international students. Each year it (8) awards financial aid to twenty students from other
countries. And it says (9) the average award last year was nineteen thousand dollars. That
would make Lewis and Clark cheaper for international students than the University of
Oregon.

But, of course, prices (10) alone do not say anything about the quality of a school or the
value of an education.

And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Our
Foreign Student Series is online at voaspecialenglish.com. If you have a general question
about American colleges and universities, we might answer your question in our series. Tell
us your name and where you are. Use the Contact Us link at voaspecialenglish.com or write
to [email protected]. This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

Colleges and Degrees

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

We answer questions from two students this week in part five of our (1) Foreign Student
Series on American higher education.

Sylla Hamed in Ghana wants to know the difference between a university and a (2)
community college. And Marcelo Porto Nicola in (3) Brazil asks about the difference
between an undergraduate degree and a graduate degree.

Undergraduates are students in the first four years of higher education, or what (4)
Americans call college. In the United States, that means the four years after (5) twelfth
grade.
But the work does not all have to be (6) done at the same college.

For example, a student may first (7) attend a two-year school, also called a community
college or junior college. Students who complete a two-year course of study earn an (8)
associate degree.

Starting at a community college can (9) save a lot of money if students want to go on to a
four-year college or a big university. Many four-year schools will (10) accept this work as
the first two years toward a (11) bachelor's degree.

To (12) earn a bachelor's degree, students usually take general subjects during their first two
years. After that they take classes in their (13) major area of study.

Students who major in a scientific area receive a bachelor of science degree, known as a (14)
B.S. Students in the arts and (15) humanities get a B.A. -- a bachelor of arts. Schools may
also offer (16) specialized degrees, like a bachelor of music.

After students have a bachelor's degree, they may go on to earn a graduate degree – (17)
either a master's degree or a doctorate.

A master's degree generally takes two to three years of full-time study. A master of business
administration, for example, takes about two years to complete. A doctorate can take much
longer. It is the highest degree (18) offered in graduate school. Some programs require six
years of study or even longer after college.

A student may earn a doctor of philosophy degree, known as a (19) PhD, or a professional
degree in an area like medicine, law or education.

We will talk more about graduate programs later in our series.

And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Our
Foreign Student Series can be found online at voaspecialenglish.com. If you have a general
question, write to [email protected] or use the Contact Us link at voaspecialenglish.com.
Please tell us your name and where you are. We (20) might answer your question in our
reports. I'm Steve Ember.

Diploma Mills

This is the VOA Special English EDUCATION REPORT.

This week, in part seven of our Foreign Student Series, we talk more about (1)
accreditation of American colleges and universities.

To become accredited, programs have to meet quality standards that are set by an accrediting
agency. In the United States, private organizations around the country handle this process.
Schools must be (2) reaccredited every ten years, or sooner. They can lose their
accreditation if they have problems that are not corrected within a given period of time.

For example, the George Washington University Medical School (3) announced last week
that it was correcting problems found by its accrediting agency. The medical school in
Washington, D.C., has been given two years to meet the standards. School officials said the
(4) changes include writing more detailed course objectives and providing more study areas
for students.

The process of accreditation is designed in part to protect against "diploma mills." These
operations call themselves colleges or universities but provide no real education.

In August, a husband and wife were sentenced to three years in (5) federal prison in a case
in the northwestern state of Washington. They operated Saint Regis University and more than
one hundred other diploma mills. These businesses supplied (6) worthless degrees to more
than nine thousand people in the United States and around the world. The couple got seven
million dollars.

George Gollin, a physics professor at the University of Illinois, is an (7) expert on

accreditation who helped investigate the case. He advises students to get the exact name of a
school they are interested in, then look for it on the Web site of a group known as CHEA.
CHEA is (8) the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. The address is chea.org.

Make sure a school or program is accredited by a legally recognized accrediting agency

before paying any money. Only (9) legitimate schools and programs are listed on the site. It
also lists the only legally recognized agencies.

Experts advise students to be (10) suspicious of offers from schools that do not require much
work or interaction with teachers. One warning sign is any offer of college credit for "life
experience."

And that's the VOA Special English EDUCATION REPORT, written by Nancy Steinbach. A
link to the CHEA Web site can be found, along with our continuing Foreign Student Series,
at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

TOEFL or IELTS

This is the VOA Special English EDUCATION REPORT.

For the past 2 weeks, we have talked about the SAT and ACT college (1) admissions tests
and the GRE for graduate school. This week in our Foreign Students Series, we move on to
English language tests.

Most American colleges and universities accept one or both of the two major tests. One is the
Test of English as a Foreign Language, known as the TOEFL. The other is the International
English Language Testing System, or IELTS.

The TOEFL is given in 180 countries. The (2) competing IELTS is given in 121 countries.

One million people each year take the TOEFL, says Tom Ewing, (3) a spokesman for the
Educational Testing Service. Same with the IELTS, says Beryl Meiron, the executive director
of IELTS International.

She says 2000 colleges and universities in the United States now recognize the IELTS.
Schools (4) might accept it only for undergraduate or graduate admission or both.

The IELTS is a paper test, while the TOEFL is given on paper only in places where a
computer test is (5) unavailable.

The TOEFL paper test costs $150.00. It tests reading, listening and writing. A (6) separate
Test of Spoken English costs $125.00 dollars.

The computer version is called the TOEFL iBT, or Internet-based test. The price is different
in each country, but generally falls between $150.00-$200.00.

The TOEFL iBT and the IELTS both (7) measure all 4 language skills-- listening, reading,
writing and speaking. But with the IELTS, the speaking test is done separately as a live
interview. You speak with an examiner who is (8) certified in ESOL-- English for speakers
of other languages.

Everyone takes the same speaking and listening tests. But there is a choice of 2 kinds of
reading and writing tests-- either academic or general training.

IELTS International says the test measures (9) true-to-life ability to communicate in English
for education, immigration and employment. Institutions in Britain and Australia jointly
developed it.

The cost is different in each country. But Beryl Meiron says the price in local currency is
generally comparable to about (10) $160.00. The IELTS Web site is ielts.org. The TOEFL
Web site is toefl.org.

And that's the VOA Special English EDUCATION REPORT, written by Nancy Steinbach.
Our Foreign Student Series is online at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.