The US-based Educational Testing Service (ETS), which develops the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC), released the results of its 2018 survey last month, showing as high as 94.8 percent of Taiwan’s top enterprises attach importance to employees’ ability to communicate in English. They also require an average of 582 points on the TOEIC for newcomers.
For mid- and high-level managers, 684 and 726 are required respectively in the 990-point test. However, since many schools have cut English courses to save money in recent years, the average score for Taiwanese university students last year was a mere 514, and for vocational university students it was only 425. This means that many university students are barely able to reach the threshold for employment.
In order to meet the threshold, more people have now turned to English cram schools or TOEIC preparation books. In light of this trend, “Hackers New TOEIC Voca” was crowned the No. 1 bestseller by Books.com Co. last year, becoming the first ever language learning book to top the platform’s annual list.
Photo courtesy of Kirby Yang
照片︰楊士璿提供
(Eddy Chang, Taipei Times)
「多益英語測驗」的開發者美國教育測驗服務社，上個月公布了二○一八年的調查報告，其結果顯示在台灣的大企業中，高達百分之九十四‧八很重視員工「用英文溝通的能力」，對新進員工多益的要求平均為五百八十二分。
至於中階與高階主管，則分別被要求必須具備六百八十四分、七百二十六分的水準，滿分則是九百九十分。然而近年來許多學校為了節省經費紛紛大砍英語課程，導致台灣的大學生去年平均僅五百一十四分，技職大學的學生更只有四百二十五分，這意味著許多大學生根本無法達到就業門檻。
為了跨過門檻，不少人轉而求助於英語補習班或多益參考書。在這股風潮下，《新制多益New TOEIC單字大全》去年甚至登上博客來年度暢銷書排行榜冠軍，這也是首次有語言學習書籍榮登該平台年度冠軍寶座。
(台北時報張聖恩)
Taiwan Travelogue, the novel by Taiwanese author Yang Shuang-zi and translated into English by Lin King, won the prestigious International Booker Prize in London on May 19. It marks the first time a Taiwanese literary work has received the International Booker Prize, setting a historic milestone both for Taiwanese literature and for the award itself. Prior to this achievement, Taiwan had only once appeared on the Booker radar, when Taiwanese author Wu Ming-yi was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2018 with The Stolen Bicycle. The International Booker Prize honors works of fiction translated into English and published in the UK or Ireland.
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