undergraduate中等

High school students eager to stand out in the college application process often participate in a litany of extracurricular activities hoping to bolster their chances of admission to a selective undergraduate institution.

渴望在大学申请过程中脱颖而出的高中生常常参加一连串的课外活动，希望借此提高被一所择优录取的本科院校录取的机会。

Experts say demonstrating talent in at least one extracurricular activity can help in the college admissions process, especially at top-tier undergraduate institutions.

专家们说，在至少一项课外活动中展示才华有助于大学录取，尤其是在顶尖的本科院校。

As the latest crop of students pen their undergraduate application form and weigh up their options, it may be worth considering just how the point, purpose and value of a degree has changed and what Generation Z need to consider as they start the third stage of their educational journey.

在新一批学生填写本科申请表、权衡各种选择之际，或许值得思考一下：学位的意义、目的和价值究竟发生了怎样的变化，以及Z世代在开启教育旅程的第三阶段时需要考虑些什么。

postpone their undergraduate application.

推迟本科申请

There is just one path for a lawyer in most American states: a four-year undergraduate degree in some unrelated subject, then a three-year law degree at one of 200 law schools authorized by the American Bar Association and an expensive preparation for the bar exam.

在美国大多数州，成为律师只有一条路：先读一个四年制的不相关专业的本科学位，然后在美国律师协会认可的200所法学院之一攻读三年制法律学位，再花一大笔钱准备律师资格考试。

This leaves today’s average law-school graduate with $100,000 of debt on top of undergraduate debts.

这使得如今法学院毕业生在本科债务之外平均还要背负10万美元的债务。

But now most colleges, save for many selective campuses, allow all undergraduates, and even graduate students, to get their low grades forgiven.

但如今，除了许多选拔严格的学校外，大多数大学都允许所有本科生甚至研究生的低分得到豁免。

Tim Harford, author of Messy: The Power of Disorder to Transform Our Lives, points to a study in the early 1980s that divided undergraduates into two groups: some were advised to set out monthly goals and study activities; others were told to plan activities and goals in much more detail, day by day.

《混乱：无序改变生活的力量》一书的作者蒂姆·哈福德提到20世纪80年代初的一项研究，该研究把大学生分成两组：一组被建议制定每月的目标和学习活动；另一组则被要求逐日、更加详细地规划活动和目标。

Most of the first-generation students (59.1 percent) were recipients of Pell Grants, a federal grant for undergraduates with financial need, while this was true only for 8.6 percent of the students with at least one parent with a four-year degree.

大多数第一代大学生（59.1%）获得了佩尔助学金——一种面向经济困难本科生的联邦助学金，而在父母至少一方拥有四年制学位的学生中，这一比例仅为8.6%。

His concern is mainly with the humanities: literature, languages, philosophy and so on. These are disciplines that are going out of style: 22% of American college graduates now major in business compared with only 2% in history and 4% in English. However, many leading American universities want their undergraduates to have a grounding in the basic canon of ideas that every educated person should possess. But most find it difficult to agree on what a “general education” should look like. At Harvard, Mr. Menand notes, “the great books are read because they have been read” — they form a sort of social glue.

他关注的主要是人文学科：文学、语言、哲学等。这些学科正在变得不受欢迎：如今22%的美国大学毕业生主修商科，而主修历史的只有2%，主修英语的只有4%。然而，许多美国一流大学希望本科生打好基础，掌握每一个受过教育的人都应具备的基本思想经典。但大多数大学难以就“通识教育”应该是什么样子达成一致。梅南先生指出，在哈佛，“名著之所以被阅读，是因为它们一直被人阅读”——它们形成了一种社会黏合剂。

One reason why it is hard to design and teach such courses is that they cut across the insistence by top American universities that liberal-arts education and professional education should be kept separate, taught in different schools. Many students experience both varieties. Although more than half of Harvard undergraduates end up in law, medicine or business, future doctors and lawyers must study a non-specialist liberal-arts degree before embarking on a professional qualification.

此类课程难以设计和讲授的原因之一在于，它们与美国顶尖大学的一贯主张相抵触，即博雅教育和职业教育应当分开，由不同的学院讲授。许多学生两种教育都会经历。虽然超过一半的哈佛本科生最终从事法律、医学或商业，但未来的医生和律师在攻读职业资格之前，必须先读一个非专业性的文科学位。