实战口语情景对话 第1121期:Is College Worth It? 应该上大学吗?

Todd: So Marianne, we're talking about education. And things are changing. Society is changing as it always is. But these days, you can pretty much learn anything on your own. And there is a new debate going around that colleges no longer serve the purpose that it used to. That basically, you can just learn what you want to learn without going to college. What do you think about that?
托德：玛丽安，我们来谈谈教育。情况正在发生改变。社会像往常一样在发生变化。现在，你可以自学。现在有种新的说法，认为大学不再像以前那样发挥作用。基本上来说，不上大学你也可以学到你想学到的知识。你怎么看？

Marianne: Yes, that's a very good question. I really love this possibility of having access to knowledge just by yourself without having to attend a college for example. It's a great chance for everyone to have access to this knowledge. So I can think it's a good thing. But I don't know why. I'm kind of skeptical because I think at some point, you have to have a time where you can exchange with a teacher or at least with other people who have the same knowledge as you. Because if you never, if you don't have this time and space where you can debate about what you learned, then there is no increase of the level of thinking. Like because you need to debate about things to learn more or maybe to correct things. It's like the Wikipedia, right. Like it's a contributive dictionary or – encyclopedia. But everybody is writing in this page. And sometimes you see some updates but you don't know why, for example, someone made the change because you don't have the space where you can debate about is this wrong or correct about like the information that was uploaded was wrong or correct. And if you just see the correction but you couldn't debate about this, then you cannot understand. So I think for me, having a time and a space where you can debate is very important. And this is a place and the time that college can offer, for example, debate between teachers or debate between students about some topics.
玛丽安：对，这是个很好的问题，我非常喜欢这种可能性，不用上大学也可以接触到知识。对所有人来说，这是能接触到知识的大好机会。所以我认为这是件好事，不过我说不清楚原因。其实我有点怀疑，因为我认为你需要同老师或者同和你拥有同样知识的人交流。如果不进行交流，不对所学的知识进行讨论，那你的思想水平就不会提高。你要进行讨论，才能学习更多知识，还有纠正你的错误。以维基百科为例。维基百科是有帮助的词典或者说是百科全书。所有人都可以进行编辑。但是有时你看到那些更新的信息，却不知道原因，比如，有人进行了更改，可是因为你没有讨论空间，不能就这个信息是否正确进行讨论，不能纠正这个信息。如果你看到修正信息，可是你不能进行讨论，那你就不会明白。我认为，有时间和空间进行讨论非常重要。而这正是大学可以提供的，比如老师之间或是学生之间针对某个课题进行讨论。

Todd: Wow! Those are really good points. Yeah, I agree. You know, I've taught at university for a while. And I do see some of the points of being a self-learner and just basically getting what you want – getting the information you want online. But the problem is, when you go to university, you have that void or the vacuum really. And so, you're going to fill that with all these different types of information. And you might see things that you aren't – that you didn't even know that you liked. And also, there's that social element that's really strong in college. I don't think you're going to find that anywhere else where you, you know, make friends, you make relationships that last your whole life. So I'm still a big believer of college but I can see that maybe we need to change the model to make them little bit better.
托德：哇哦！你提出的观点太棒了。我同意你的看法。我在大学任教过一段时间。我的确看到过一些自学者从网上获取他们需要的信息。但是，大学有那种真空时间。你可以通过查阅各种信息来填补这个时间。你可以了解你甚至都不知道自己是否喜欢的信息。另外，大学有浓厚的社交氛围。我认为，除了大学，你在其他任何地方都不会交到可以持续一生的朋友。所以，我依然是大学的坚定拥护者，不过我认为我们要改变模式使大学变得更好。

Marianne: Uh-hmm.
玛丽安：嗯。

Todd: Which brings us to another question: how do you think we can change college to make better? Like what are some changes we can make to college?
托德：这就引出了另一个问题：你认为我们怎么能把大学变得更好？我们应该怎样改变大学？

Marianne: Wow.
玛丽安：哇哦。

Todd: Like I have one idea. One idea I have is that we're starting to see it a little bit with MOOCs but there's no reason that you can't take a class at any other university via video from your university. So example, if you go to UCLA, you can take art classes from Harvard or somewhere else. I think that would be really good if you can start doing that. So you're not only limited to the professors on your campus.
托德：我有个想法。可以先从网络公开课开始，没有理由在大学不能通过视频来上课。举个例子，假设你在加州大学洛杉矶分校上学，你可以听哈佛大学或是其他大学的艺术课程。我认为这样开始很不错。这样就不会只能听到自己大学的教授讲课。

Marianne: Wow. Yes, that's a great idea. Yes.
玛丽安：哇哦。这个想法很不错。

Todd: Anything that you, looking back, you wish you could have done differently at university?
托德：回想一下，有没有什么事是你希望在大学时能做得更好的？

Marianne: Well the big issue about university especially in the US is that it costs a lot of money. And so, if we could find ways to – because for example, you are talking about having access to a lot of content information for free actually – I mean, for free. Like you just have to pay your Internet connection and suddenly, you have access to a lot of knowledge. But when you go to college, it costs a lot of money. So this is a big issue actually. So if you could find a way to, financially speaking, like if we can find a way to make university more accessible to a wider audience, it could be nice. But I know it's difficult because we have to pay teachers. We have to pay all the infrastructures about university, so it costs a lot of money. So I don't have the solution right now but I think working on this like free education or cheaper education – I mean, cheaper in a way talking about the entrance fee, not losing the quality of education. Yeah. If we can work on this point.
玛丽安：大学，尤其是美国大学最大的问题就是学费太贵。希望我们能找到免费获取大量信息的方法。只需要连网就能获取大量知识。可是上大学要花很多钱。所以这是一个重大的问题。从经济角度来讲，如果能找到使更多人可以负担得起大学的方法，那就太好了。我知道这很难，因为我们还要付老师工资。我们要支付大学所有基础设施的费用，所以会耗费很多钱。我现在也没有解决方法，不过我想致力于义务教育或者更低廉的教育费用，比如减少学费，但是不损失教育质量。希望我们能致力于这方面。

Todd: Yeah. I totally agree.
托德：对，我完全同意你的观点。