135 MA Your school has enough money to purchase either computers for students or books for the library. Which should your school choose to buy—computers or books? Use specific reasons and examples to support your recommendation.

Our school has been given a grant to make necessary improvements to its facilities. We can spend it on new books for the library or on more computers. Our school already has books in its library and it already has computers. Since we have more books than computers, I think that new computers will benefit the student more.

Computers can access up-to–date information on the Internet. Right now, the reference books in our library are very outdated. Our encyclopedia set is eight years old. But if every student had access to a computer, we all could have the latest facts and figures on everything.

Unfortunately, giving every student a computer means we need a lot of computers. Right now, the ratio of computers to students is one to twelve. This means students only get to work on the computers three or four times a week. But if every student had a computer, we could use it whenever we wanted.

“Information on demand” should be our slogan. Students today need lots of information right away. Life goes by too quickly to wait. It takes forever to identify a book that you think might have the information you need. Then you have to go to the library and look for the book. Usually it’s not even there.

With a computer, information searches are instantaneous. If we all had computers, we could access more information and access it faster by computer. We could have all the information we needed for our schoolwork. We could all improve our grades. For these reasons, I feel that purchasing more computers will benefit us more than buying more books.

136 MA Many students choose to attend schools or universities outside their home countries. Why do some student abroad? Use specific reasons and details to explain your answer.

Although students can get a good education in most subjects at their home universities, it is important to study abroad for some or part of one’s college education. Study abroad can give a student competency in a new language, familiarity with a different culture, and a chance to grow in different ways.
   
One cannot deny that it is important to be bilingual or even multilingual in today’s fast-paced world. We have a global economy and communication by Internet and satellite TV means we must be familiar with other languages in order to keep up with new developments.
   
Knowing another culture is also important today. Respect for other people and their traditions will foster cooperation and peace. We should all do our part to make sure the world is safe for our children. It will only be safe if we understand and respect other people and their culture.

When we are out of our environment, we feel freer to experiment with different ways of doing things. We are all individuals and we need time to be on our own, away from our comfortable nests. We may try different things and reject them. We might also adopt them. People can change and it is easier to change when you are away from your family surroundings.

Study abroad can be enriching. Not only can we learn a new language, understand more about a different culture, but we can learn more about ourselves too. At the same time, of course, we are getting an education in the formal sense.