第一题：
In-state tuition. For decades, it was the one advantage big state schools had that even the Ivy League couldn't match, in terms of recruiting the best and the brightest to their campuses. But these days, that's no longer necessarily the case. Starting this September, some students will find a Harvard degree cheaper than one from many public universities. Harvard officials sent shock waves through academia last December by detailing a new financial-aid policy that will charge families making up to $180,000 just 10% of their household income per year, substantially subsidizing the annual cost of more than $45,600 for all but its wealthiest students. The move was just the latest in what has amounted to a financial-aid bidding war in recent years among the U.S.'s élite universities.
Though Harvard's is the most generous to date, Princeton, Yale and Stanford have all launched similar plans to cap tuition contributions for students from low- and middle-income families. Indeed, students on financial aid at nearly every Ivy stand a good chance of graduating debt-free, thanks to loan-elimination programs introduced over the past five years. And other exclusive schools have followed their lead by replacing loans with grants and work-study aid. And several more schools are joining the no-loan club this fall. Even more schools have taken steps to reduce debt among their neediest students.
【参考译文】
数十年来，州内学费是大型州立学校得天独厚的优势，连常春藤联盟都无法匹敌，因为这能为学校招来最优秀、最聪明的学生。但是如今，情况却未必如此。从今年九月起，一些学生会发现读一个哈佛大学的学位比许多公立大学的还要便宜。去年十二月，哈佛官员详细阐述了一项新的财政资助政策，对于年收入不高于180000美元的家庭，只收取其中的10%作为学费。绝大多数学生的家庭经济条件一般，本来每年要缴纳45600多美元的学费，对他们而言，这可谓一份厚礼，整个学术界为之震动。近年来，美国的精英大学纷纷出台财政资助政策，相互之间打得不可开交，哈佛大学的这一举措只是其中最新的一项。
尽管哈佛开出的条件是迄今最优厚的，普林斯顿、耶鲁和斯坦福都出台了类似的计划，来降低中低收入家庭的学生所需支付的学费。而且，由于过去五年里采用的免贷款计划，如今几乎每一所常春藤盟校里接受资助的学生都很可能无债一身轻地毕业。其它收费昂贵的学校纷纷效仿，取消了贷款，发放助学金和勤工俭学补助。今年秋天，还有几所学校会加入这个“无贷款俱乐部”。更多的学校都已采取措施，为最需要资助的学生减少债务。
第二题：
There was once a farmer who had a fine olive orchard. He was very hardworking, and the farm always prospered under his care. But he knew that his three sons despised the farm work, and were eager to make wealth, trough adventure.
When the farmer was old, and felt that his time had come to die, he called the three sons to him and said, "My sons, there is a pot of gold hidden in the olive orchard. Dig for it, if you wish it."
The sons tried to get him to tell them in what part of the orchard the gold was hidden; but he would tell them nothing more.
After the farmer was dead, the sons went to work to find the pot of gold; since they did not know where the hiding-place was, they agreed to begin in a line, at one end of the orchard, and to dig until one of them should find the money.
They dug until they had turned up the soil from one end of the orchard to the other, round the tree-roots and between them. But no pot of gold was to be found. It seemed as if someone must have stolen it, or as if the farmer had been wandering in his wits. The three sons were bitterly disappointed to have all their work for nothing.
The next olive season, the olive trees in the orchard bore more fruit than they had ever given; when it was sold, it gave the sons a whole pot of gold.
And when they saw how much money had come from the orchard, they suddenly understood what the wise father had meant when he said, "There is gold hidden in the orchard. Dig for it, if you wish it."
从前有一个农民，他有一座漂亮的橄榄园。他非常勤劳，而且农场在他的照管下蒸蒸日上。可他知道自己的三个儿子瞧不起农活，都迫不及待的想通过冒险发家致富。
这个农民上了年岁，感到死期快要来临时，将三个儿子叫到身边说：“儿子们，橄榄园里藏有一罐金子。你们想要，就去挖吧。”
儿子们想让父亲告诉他们金子藏在果园的那一块地方，可他什么也没再给他们说。
那个农民死后，三个儿子就开始挖地，想找到那罐金子;因为他们不知道金子藏在什么地方，所以他们一致同意排成一行从果园的一头开始挖起，知道其中一人挖到金子为止.
他们挖啊挖，从果园的一头一直挖到了另一头，果树周围和果树之间也都挖到了，可还是没有找到那罐金子。看来一定是有人已经把那罐金子头走了，要么就是他们的父亲一直在异想天开。三个儿子对他们白干了一场，感到大失所望。
到了第二年的橄榄季节，果园里的橄榄树接出的果子比以往的都多;卖完果子后，三个儿子赚了整整一罐金子。
他们从果园里得到这么多钱后，突然明白了聪明的父亲所说的“果园里藏有金子，想要就去挖吧”这句话的含义。
