Английский язык для аспирантов и соискателей. Минакова Т.В. - 24 стр.

graduates - quality, excellence and teamwork ability. Their call to action has not gone
us heard. We have undertaken here a major reevaluation of our curriculum and are
implementing a new freshman year sequence that integrates oral and written
communication, computing skills and engineering concepts.
     We have initiated a new mechanical engineering design thrust, one that
increases hands-on real-world experience by emphasizing synthesis and the
fundamentals of design and manufacture. We also have started a new undergraduate
research seminar series to further broaden student experience…
     … We already are an information society. The need for an increasingly
technologically oriented work force for the 21st century, competent in computing,
mathematics and information technology, certainly will not diminish.
     If we abandon the research university, which has provided much of America's
knowledge base and education infrastructure, how can we possibly train future
generations of workers? How will we solve tomorrow's problems?
     How will we develop tomorrow's needed technologies? We need research
universities that are strong and vital more now than ever before.

     2.1.1 Discussion

      1 What are the points raised in the article?
      2 What are the key factors in the relationships among universities, industry, and
government in the USA and Russia?
      3 What points would you stress if you had to describe to an American student
the relationships among universities, industry, and government in Russia?

     2.1.2 Read the experts from an interview by Boris Saltykov with MN’s
correspondent on the problems of Russian fundamental science. Use the information
when discussing the questions that follow:

                    Russian Scientific Potential To Be Fully Tapped Yet
      As he arrived in Stockholm to receive a Nobel Prize, Academician Alexei
Abrikosov, who has long been living in the United States, said: This is probably the
last prestigious prize to be awarded to Russian scientists because domestic science
today gets hardly any funding at all while the best brains have already fled abroad.
The other Russian Nobel Prize winner, Academician Vitaly Ginzburg, is of a
different opinion: The country still has enough intellectual potential for scientific
breakthroughs.
      How long will it be before this potential runs out? And, is it only the financial
crunch that is ruining Russian science? Boris Saltykov, president of the Russian
House of International Science-and-Technology Cooperation association and, in
1991-96, RF science and technology policy minister, talks about these and other
problems in an interview with MN’s Tatyana Skorobogatko.
      So, what is the outlook for Russians winning more Nobel Prizes in the
foreseeable future?

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