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A-level Disillusionment
A等级幻灭
Anne Barrie's "Do We Over-educate Our Children?" reminded me that the German author Gunter Grass once said that failing his school leaving exams was a blessing without which he would never have achieved the position he now holds.
安妮·巴瑞的《我们是不是给我们的孩子太多的教育了？》使我想到德国作家君特·格拉斯曾经说过的，他没有通过中学毕业考试是一件幸事，否则他就永远不可能取得现有的地位。
I wonder how many other great men and women owe their success to having failed in their academic careers.
不知道有多少其他伟人和名人们将所取得的成就归功于他们在学业上的失败。
I was a schoolgirl in the 1960s - the time when it was believed that the future wealth of the country depended on the education of the young:
60年代，我还是一名中学女生，那是一个认为国家未来的富足寄托于年轻人的教育的时代：
money was plentiful, new universities sprang up and great myths evolved to lure young people into the academic life.
资金充裕，不断有新的大学出现，教育神话的巨大诱惑使年轻人都追求学业上的成就。
Three years later, I obtained a first-class degree in mathematics.
3年后，我获得了数学的头等学位。
For some months there had been pressure to try for a further degree - the more post-graduate students there are, the more financial benefits exist for us.
好几个月里，我面临着研读更高学位的压力&&研究生越多，经济利益就会越多。
My fellow postgraduates and I knew nothing of the outside world, and happily believed that academic life for another three years would enhance us in the eyes of future employers:
我和我的研究生同学们丝毫不了解外面的世界，高枕无忧地认为学业上再深造三年能增加我们在未来老板眼里的价值。
and so I went to London and began work for a doctorate.
于是我到了伦敦，开始攻读博士学位。
Here, for the first time, I came across "mature students" - people who had left school at 16 and, years later, taken A-levels at technical colleges and come to university.
在那里我第一次遇到了“成熟的学生”，他们十六岁就离开了学校，几年后在技术学院参加了A等级课程考试，然后上了大学。
Having chosen their subject with great care, and being more mature, they found a joy in their courses unknown to most of us.
他们的专业是经过深思熟虑后选择的，他们更成熟，能在所修的课程中获得大多数我们这样的学生无法体会到的乐趣。
I have been working now for several years:
现在我已经工作好几年了，
life has been very different from what I had been led to expect.
现实生活和我们在学校的环境下所期待的样子完全不同。
However, it is too late to change: the state of understanding will not pay to reeducate people completely.
不过，现在做出改变已经太晚了，醒悟并不能给我们带来完全的再教育。
As I think back, I regret that I did not fail my A-levels.
回想起来，我真后悔当年没有让我的A等级课程考试不及格。
