世界迎来开学季：说说上学的那些事儿_公共英语阅读理解

世界迎来开学季：说说上学的那些事儿

Parents aren’t the only ones who pay the price for school. Just think of the trees.

为孩子上学付出代价的不只有父母，还有树木。

Even in the age of virtual reality, 3D printing and drones, the simple pencil continues to make a mark in institutions across the world. Today, more than 400 years after their invention, an estimated 15 to 20 billion pencils are produced each year.

即使是在虚拟现实、3D打印和无人机时代，简单的铅笔依然继续在世界各地的学校中存在。在铅笔被发明了400多年后的今天，每年约有150亿到200亿根铅笔被生产出来。

Cedar trees found in the Pacific Northwest are the most common source of pencil wood in the US, while most of the graphite is mined in China and Sri Lanka. Approximately 60,000 to 80,000 trees are cut each year to maintain the world's pencil supply. (Source: The Economist)

太平洋西北地区的雪松是美国铅笔用木的最大来源地，而多数铅笔所用的石墨采自中国和斯里兰卡。为了给全球供应铅笔，每年要砍掉6万到8万棵树。（数据来源：《经济学人》杂志）

Students in Australia attend class for a quarter of their lifetime.

澳大利亚人一生的四分之一时间都在上学。

At some point, school is meant to end. But in countries like New Zealand and Iceland, that isn’t for almost two decades. A student’s ‘school life expectancy’ is calculated by the average enrolment rates for different ages from primary school to the undergraduate university level. Australia currently holds the longest expectancy at 22.9 years from primary school to university, or from six years old to about 28. At the bottom of the list is Niger, where students generally begin primary school at the age of seven. Here, the average time a student spends in school is as few as 5.3 years – a 17-year difference. (Source: Global Innovation Index)