A.

LISTENING (50 points)

Part 1: You will listen to a short conversation about job vacancies in
restaurants. For questions 1-5, complete the table using NO MORE THAN
TWO WORDS AND/ OR A NUMBER for each answer. (10 points)

Location Job title Responsibilities Pay and conditions

Wivenhoe Breakfast Checking (1) Starting salary 9.50

Street supervisor ________ per hour

Making sure Start work at (2)

equipment is clean ________

(3) Junior chef Supporting the Annual salary £23,000

_________ senior staff and (4) No work on every (5)
_ ______ _______
Maintaining stock
and arranging
deliveries

Your Answer:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Part 2. For questions 6-10, listen to a talk about how to keep calm under
pressure and decide whether these statements are True (T), False (F). Write
your answers in the corresponding numbered boxes provided. (10 points)
6. A repeated breathing exercise will help you feel calmer.

7. If you are going to speak in public, it’s helpful to breathe quickly.

8. When you feel panic, a deep breathing through your nose will do you good.

9. Research has shown that humming cannot stimulate heart rate.

10. Sports trainers always use “process thinking” to help athletes focus.

Your answers:

6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Part 3. For questions 11-15, listen to an interview with the head of an

employment agency about job expectations and choose the best answer
(A, B, C or D) which fits best according to what you hear. Write your
answers in the corresponding numbered boxes provided. (10 points)
11. How does Diane Webber view ‘jobs for life’?

A. She regrets the fact that this situation is no longer the norm.

B. She feels that many long-serving employees failed to make a useful

contribution.

C. She believes that people should have challenged their employers’ motives
more.

D. She wishes the workplace had been more secure in the past.

12. According to Diane, younger workers in today’s workplace ______.

A. learn all the skills they need early on. B. accept lateral moves if they are
attractive.

C. expect to receive benefits right from the start. D. change jobs regularly to
achieve a higher level.

13. What does Diane say about staff continuity in companies?

A. It is desirable in both junior and senior management.

B. It is impossible to achieve in today’s more competitive environment.

C. It is unimportant, due to the greater emphasis on teamwork.

D. It is necessary, but only up to a point.

14. According to Diane, what is the actual benefit of higher levels of personnel
movement?

A. higher levels of output B. better problem-solving

C. more creativity D. greater efficiency

15. Diane considers that nowadays, companies are at most risk from ______.

A. run-of-the-mill employees who play safe. B. successful high-fliers who

quickly move on.

C. unreliable staff who lack commitment. D. external advisors who have

undue power.

Your answers:

11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

Part 4. You will listen to a recording about Koalas. For questions 16-25,
complete the summary by writing NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS in each
gap. Write your answers in the corresponding numbered boxes provided.
(20 points)
Koalas are being particularly (16)._______________ in New South Wales as
their habitats are being destroyed.

Koala seems to be (17). ________________ and probably quite hungry.

It is estimated that hundreds of koalas have died in (18).________________

raging in Eastern Australia since September.

(19) _____________ koalas have been admitted by the region's Port

Macquarie Koala Hospital so far this year.

While the disaster has inflicted serious damage on the animal, the support from
the public has been (20).________________.
The number of visitors coming to the Koala Hospital over the last 5-6 weeks has
been (21) _________________.

A large amount of money has been set aside to help (22).________________

koalas.

There are concerns that a new heat wave could further

(23) .________________ infernos.

Very little would actually survive in there (24) ______________

Rising temperatures, which dry out their habitats, deforestation and disease
are (25).________________.

Your answers:

16. 17.

18. 19.

20. 21.

22. 23.

24. 25.

II. LEXICO-GRAMMAR (40 points)

Part 1: Choose the correct answer (A,B,C or D) to complete each of the

following sentences. Write your answers in the corresponding numbered
boxes provided. (30 points)

1. The foot _______ diligently searched the area for signs of the enemy.

A. squad B. force C. party D. patrol

2. Being a _______ entrepreneur, you will have to make a special effort for
people to take you seriously.

A. successful B. budding C. blossoming D. flowering

3. I wanted to resign, but my boss _______ with me to stay.

A. pleaded B. parted C. argued D. bargained

4. His explanation was so _______ that it left everyone more confused than
before.

A. convoluted B. precise C. lucid D. coherent

5. The artist's latest exhibition was _______ received by critics.

A. passionately B. indifferently C. warmly D. coldly

6. The manager's new policy _______ unnecessary expenditures.

A. cut off B. cut back C. cut down D. cut out

7. After months of investigation, the committee _______ the director from all
allegations of fraud.

A. liberated B. exonerated C. emancipated D.

discharged
8. The CEO is known for his _______ to innovative ideas and approaches.

A. hostility B. openness C. reservation D. opposition

9. The _______ light of the setting sun cast long shadows on the ground.

A. glaring B. dimming C. fading D. blinding

10. The film was not just a box office success; it was ______ acclaimed.
A. critically B. uncritically C. ironically D. skeptically
11. To the _______ of the committee, the proposal was rejected outright.

A. dismay B. delight C. amusement D. apathy

12. The solution to the problem was _______ in its simplicity.

A. ingenious B. naïve C. complex D. baffling

13. Despite the hype, the new restaurant did not _______ our expectations.

A. come up to B. fall short of C. live up to D. get

around to
14. The detective's keen eye for detail helped him _______ the truth.

A. uncover B. discover C. recover D. unearth

15. The scientist's theory was _______ at the conference.

A. widely discredited B. widely accepted

C. narrowly rejected D. eagerly anticipated
16. The company decided to _______ the old equipment to make way for new
technology.

A. discard B. preserve C. abandon D. retain

17. The novel's plot is _______ with unexpected twists and turns.

A. replete B. devoid C. scarce D. wanting

18. The chairman's remarks were seen as a _______ to the opposition.

A. challenge B. concession C. retreat D. surrender

19. The hotel room was _______ and offered a stunning view of the city
skyline.
A. cramped B. spacious C. confined D. narrow
20. The teacher's _______ approach made even the most difficult subjects
seem easy.

A. pedagogical B. didactic C. pedagogic D. instructional

21. Was it really necessary that I _______ there watching you the entire time
you were rehearsing for the play? It was really boring watching you repeat the
scenes over and over again.

A. sits B. am sitting C. be sitting D. To sit

22. ______ as taste is really a composite sense made up of both taste and
smell.

A. That we refer to B. What we refer to

C. To which we refer D. What do we refer to

23. ______ the increasing depletion of the Earth resources, it’s vital to recycle
on a wider scale than we do at present.

A. Given B. In spite of C. Irrespective of D.

Providing

24. On the island _______ the only representation of the island’s handicraft.

A. remain B. does it remain C. did it remain D. remains

25. _________, the balcony chairs will be ruined in this weather.

A. Leaving uncovered B. Having left uncovered

C. Left uncovered D. Been left uncovered

26. I ________ with the performances but I got flu the day before.

A. had helped B. helped C. was to help D. was to have helped

27. She said that she would be punctual for the opening speech, ______she
were late?

A. but what if B. how about C. and what about D. so if

28. In her time, Isadora Duncan was ______ today a liberated woman.

A. what calling we would B. who would be calling

C. what we would call D. she would call her

29. Our projects are funded through the Private Finance Initiative, the costs
_____ spread over ten years.

A. are B. being C. have been D. will be

30. Only when more stringent traffic laws are passed _____ on the national
highway decrease.

A. is the number of accidents B. the number of accidents is

C. the number of accidents will D. will the number of accidents

Your answers:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20.
21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30.

Part 2: For questions 1-10, write the correct form of each bracketed word in
each sentence. Write your answers in the corresponding numbered boxes
provided. (10 points)

1. Democracy died after a period of ________ (cease) wars, imperial

expansion abroad, and the rise of demagoguery at home.

2. The consequences of ________ (compel) gambling are comparable to those

of any other addictive disease and are not simply those of financial loss.

3. The prison service has the twin goals of punishment and ________ (habit).

4. The first ________ (conceive) is that legal study at university is exclusively

for students who intend becoming solicitors or advocates.

5. The ________ (intricate) of the design required exceptional skill and

attention to detail.

6. The ________ (contend) issue in the debate was how to allocate the
funding fairly.

7. The ________ (intuitive) of her solution demonstrated her deep

understanding of the problem.

8. The ________ (presume) of the young scientist in challenging established

theories was both daring and admirable.

9. The ________ (elude) of the criminal made the investigation particularly

challenging for the police.
10. The ________ (transcend) nature of the experience left everyone in awe.

Your answers:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

III. READING (60 points)

Part 1: Read the following passage and decide which answer (A, B, C, or D)
best fits each gap. (15 points)

Many artefacts of (1) …………. cultural significance from the last century were
made from plastic. It was always confidently assumed that this rather (2) ………….
material was virtually indestructible. Now that some of these artefacts have
become museum (3) …………., we have discovered that this (4) …………. was sadly
mistaken.

The degradation of plastics is worrying both scientists and historians, who are
racing against time to save our plastic heritage before it (5) …………. into dust.
Our love affair with plastics (6) …………. in large part from the fact they can be (7)
…………. into just about any shape imaginable. When it comes to longevity,
however, they have a serious (8) ………….: their chemical structure breaks down
when they are exposed to air and sunlight.

Many now argue that we must consider the cultural (9) …………. we will be leaving
future generations. Without urgent (10) …………. many artefacts will be lost
forever. But developing effective conservation strategies is difficult because
what works to preserve one type of plastic can have a catastrophic effect on
the lifespan of another.

1. A. enduring B. lingering C. unceasing D. perennial

2. A. trivial B. routine C. customary D. mundane

3. A. items B. articles C. pieces D. objects

4. A. concept B. premise C. notion D. proposition

5. A. crumbles B. shatters C. erodes D. shrivels

6. A. starts B. sparks C. stems D. sprouts

7. A. cast B. moulded C. engraved D. dissected

8. A. fault B. snag C. stigma D. flaw

9. A. bequest B. legacy C. endowment D. heirloom

10. A. intervention B. interception C. interference D. Intercession

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Part 2. For questions 1-10, read the text below and think of a word which
best fits each space. Use only ONE word in each space. Write your answers
in the corresponding numbered boxes provided. (15 points)

Advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have (1) _______ transformative

changes across various sectors, from healthcare to finance and beyond. AI
systems are (2) _______ capable of processing vast amounts of data and
performing complex tasks with unprecedented accuracy. This technological
revolution has sparked debates about the ethical implications of AI and its (3)
_______ impact on society.

One area where AI has shown remarkable promise is in healthcare. AI-

powered diagnostic tools can (4) _______ early signs of diseases with high
accuracy, potentially saving lives through early intervention. However,
concerns (5) _______ privacy and data security have emerged, as these
systems rely heavily on personal health information.

In the realm of business, AI algorithms are (6) _______ used to streamline

operations and enhance productivity. By automating repetitive tasks,
companies can allocate human resources more efficiently and (7) _______ on
strategic initiatives. Nevertheless, there is apprehension about the impact of AI
on employment, with fears that automation may (8) _______ jobs traditionally
performed by humans.

Ethically, the development of AI raises questions about accountability and

transparency. As AI systems make decisions autonomously, ensuring they
operate ethically and (9) _______ bias becomes paramount. Moreover, there
is a need for international collaboration to establish (10) _______ guidelines
that govern the ethical use of AI across borders.

Your answers:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
Part 3: Read the passage and choose the best option A, B, C, or D to answer
the questions. (15 points)

BIOLOGICAL PATENTS

The patenting on biological matter has become particularly awkward and

publicly controversial in recent times. The reason for this is that scientists are
patenting life itself, though we should be careful about what we mean by 'life'.
Many countries have allowed people to own and register plant varieties for
decades. America took the lead, starting with the 1930 Plant Patent Act,
followed by Germany and other European countries. Britain passed its Plant
Varieties and Seeds Act in 1964, when it awarded a full monopoly right to the
owner of any plant that can be shown to be novel, distinct, uniform and stable.
The test of novelty is much looser than that required for an industrial patent
(who knows what plants may be growing in the wild?). So, a plant qualifies for
protection even if it has a history of growing wild as long as it has not been sold
commercially for more than four years.

At the same time, patenting a seed or a plant for agricultural purposes was
regarded as being no different from patenting a chemical or biological recipe
for pharmaceutical purposes. This notion was particularly welcome for Western
farmers and horticulturalists who were eager to increase yields as their own
costs grew (especially farm wages) and foreign imports from low-wage
countries undercut their prices. They were also keen to grow new varieties that
could be harvested and brought to market a few weeks earlier. So, the huge
investments in faster-growing and more disease-resistant seeds over the past
fifty years might not have been made if the seed companies had not been able
to protect their work.

Over that period the number of applications for plant and genetic patents
has increased rapidly. Technological advances in biotechnology have extended
scientists' ability to exploit biological matter from whole plants into their
various components; from whole animals to parts of animals; and from animals
to humans. Developments in DNA and in cell technology have allowed scientists
to identify, nurture and remix cells so that they can create living material. The
identification of the human genome, which contains the genes that control the
'design' of each human, will also require a property contract.

But should the genome be public property in the same way as the
knowledge of blood types is? Or should it be private property? In 1952, the
American Supreme Court famously said, 'Anything under the sun that is made
by man is patentable.' Since then, its position has shifted. In Diamond v.
Chakrabarty in 1980, it was asked to rule on a patent application by Anand
Chakrabarty for a genetically modified bacterial microorganism designed to
gobble up oil spills at sea. It decided to shift the dividing line to between the
product of nature, whether living or not, and human-made inventions which
may, of course, be living, and it approved the patent. In 1987, the US Patent
Office issued new guidelines which stated that all bio-organisms except
humans could be patented.

The Patent Office later issued a patent to Harvard University for an

experimental mouse known as Oncomouse, into which an oncogene had been
inserted for the purpose of medical research. The European Patent Office, after
initially demurring, did likewise. It said Oncomouse was such a considerable
manipulation of genetic material as to be new and unique. It was protested on
ethical grounds that the mice would suffer during the research, but the EPO
decided that the benefit to society outweighed the loss to the mouse; a neat
variation on the 'property contract' that balances the creator's reward against
the social gain. This rapid shift over seven years was a breath-taking expansion
of private property and a massive change in attitude towards the ownership of
life.

Another odd case that reinterpreted the property contract against our
common instincts occurred when a Californian University medical centre
managed to own and patent the cell line found in a spleen taken from a patient
John Moore, who had hairy-cell leukaemia. The doctors had discovered that
Moore's T-lymphocytes were extremely rare and of great medical value.
Without informing him, they carried out intensive tests that ended with the
removal of his spleen. The cells were indeed as valuable as expected,
generating products worth hundreds of millions of dollars. When Moore
discovered how the university had privatised his cells, and made huge profits,
he sued, but he lost. The Supreme Court of California decided that we do not
have an exclusive right to ownership of our cells after they have left our body.

1. Under the 1964 Act, one requirement that qualified a plant for a patent was
that it

A. had been developed as a result of commercial exploitation.

B. had been discovered in the wild fewer than four years earlier.

C. exhibited characteristics that distinguished it from other plants.

D. had no prior history of being used in an industrial process.

2. The word horticulturalists refers to those who

A. grow flowers B. study cultures C. import seeds D. grow organic

foods

3. Why were Western farmers keen to raise production levels in the 1960s?

A. Their overheads were making them less competitive.

B. The market price of their products had been reduced.

C. Disease that could destroy their crops was becoming rife.

D. Fast-growing weeds were making their harvest less lucrative.

4. The writer suggests that advances in biotechnology

A. have allowed scientists to conduct their experiments more precisely.

B. are dependent on the financial rewards they can generate.

C. will ultimately lead to the introduction of designer babies.

D. may be considered unethical if they involve exploitation.

5. The phrase gobble up mostly means

A. consuming B. supplying C. spreading D.

destroying

6. The shift in position of the US Supreme Court in 1980 meant that

A. any biological organism could be patented.

B. knowledge of how DNA functions was patentable.

C. patents were no longer restricted to inanimate things.

D. tinkering with cells from living creatures was immoral.

7. The word demurring mostly means

A. advocating B. objecting C. reinforcing D.

investigating

8. The European Patent Office ruling on Oncomouse

A. was never in doubt because Harvard University was involved.

B. became open to interpretation by experts in property laws.

C. totally disregarded the moral issues related to the case.

D. highlighted the emphasis on the greater good in legal decisions.

9. Which saying is most appropriate to the verdict handed down in the case
involving John Moore?

A. Property has its duties as well as its rights.

B. No person's property is safe while legislature is in session.

C. If something is worth money, it is worth possessing.

D. Possession is nine-tenths of the law.

10. Which of the following is NOT true, according to the passage?

A. Patenting Oncomouse met with some disapprovals concerning ethical

matters.

B. The USA blazed a trailed in patenting kinds of plants.

C. The doctors removed Moore’s spleen unbeknownst to him.

D. Companies’ patenting their seeds provided an incentive for agricultural

breakthroughs.

Your answers:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Part 4: Read the text below carefully and then do the following exercises.
(15 points)

RISING SEA

Paragraph 1 - INCREASED TEMPERATURES

The average air temperature at the surface of the earth has risen this century,
as has the temperature of ocean surface waters. Because water expands as it
heats, a warmer ocean means higher sea levels. We cannot say definitely that
the temperature rises are due to the greenhouse effect; the heating may be
part of a ‘natural’ variability over a long time - scale that we have not yet
recognized in our short 100 years of recording. However, assuming the buildup
of greenhouse gases is responsible, and that the warming will continue,
scientists – and inhabitants of low-lying coastal areas – would like to know the
extent of future sea level rises.

Paragraph 2

Calculating this is not easy. Models used for the purpose have treated the
ocean as passive, stationary and one -dimensional. Scientists have assumed
that heat simply diffused into the sea from the atmosphere. Using basic
physical laws, they then predict how much a known volume of water would
expand for a given increase in temperature. But the oceans are not one -
dimensional, and recent work by oceanographers, using a new model which
takes into account a number of subtle facets of the sea – including vast and
complex ocean currents –suggests that the rise in sea level may be less than
some earlier estimates had predicted.

Paragraph 3
An international forum on climate change, in 1986, produced figures for likely
sea-level rises of 20 cms and 1.4 m, corresponding to atmospheric temperature
increases of 1.5 and 4.5C respectively. Some scientists estimate that the ocean
warming resulting from those temperature increases by the year 2050 would
raise the sea level by between 10 cms and 40 cms. This model only takes into
account the temperature effect on the oceans; it does not consider changes in
sea level brought about by the melting of ice sheets and glaciers, and changes
in groundwater storage. When we add on estimates of these, we arrive at
figures for total sea-level rises of 15 cm and 70 cm respectively.

Paragraph 4
It’s not easy trying to model accurately the enormous complexities of the ever-
changing oceans, with their great volume, massive currents and sensitively to
the influence of land masses and the atmosphere. For example, consider how
heat enters the ocean. Does it just ‘diffuse’ from the warmer air vertically into
the water, and heat only the surface layer of the sea? (Warm water is less
dense than cold, so it would not spread downwards). Conventional models of
sea-level rise have considered that this the only method, but measurements
have shown that the rate of heat transfer into the ocean by vertical diffusion is
far lower in practice than the figures that many modelers have adopted.

Paragraph 5

Much of the early work, for simplicity, ignored the fact that water in the oceans
moves in three dimensions. By movement, of course, scientists don’t mean
waves, which are too small individually to consider, but rather movement of
vast volumes of water in huge currents. To understand the importance of this,
we now need to consider another process – advection. Imagine smoke rising
from a chimney. On a still day it will slowly spread out in all directions by means
of diffusion. With a strong directional wind, however, it will all shift downwind,
this process is advection – the transport of properties (notably heat and salinity
in the ocean) by the movement of bodies of air or water, rather than by
conduction or diffusion.

Paragraph 6.

Massive ocean currents called gyres do the moving. These currents have far
more capacity to store heat than does the atmosphere. Indeed, just the top 3 m
of the ocean contains more heat than the whole of the atmosphere. The origin
of gyres lies in the fact that more heat from the Sun reaches the Equator than
the Poles, and naturally heat tends to move from the former to the latter. Warm
air rises at the Equator, and draws more air beneath it in the form of winds (the
“Trade Winds”) that, together with other air movements, provide the main force
driving the ocean currents.

Paragraph 7

Water itself is heated at the Equator and moves poleward, twisted by the
Earth’s rotation and affected by the positions of the continents. The resultant
broadly circular movements between about 10 and 40 North and South are
clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere. They flow towards the east at mid
latitudes in the equatorial region. They then flow towards the Poles, along the
eastern sides of continents, as warm currents. When two different masses of
water meet, one will move beneath the other, depending on their relative
densities in the subduction process.The densities are determined by
temperature and salinity. the convergence of water of different densities from
the Equator and the Poles deep in the oceans causes continuous subduction.
This means that water moves vertically as well as horizontally. Cold water from
the Poles travels as depth – it is denser than warm water –until it emerges at
the surface in another part of the world in the form of a cold current.

Paragraph 8
HOW THE GREEN HOUSE EFFECT WILL CHANGE OCEAN TEMPERATURES

Ocean currents, in three dimensions, form a giant ‘conveyor belt’, distributing

heat from the thin surface layer into the interior of the oceans and around the
globe. Water may take decades to circulate in these 3-D gyres in the lop
kilometer of the ocean, and centuries in the deep water. With the increased
atmospheric temperatures due to the greenhouse effect, the oceans conveyor
belt will carry more heat into the interior. This subduction moves heat around
far more effectively than simple diffusion. Because warm water expands more
than cold when it is heated, scientists had presumed that the sea level would
rise unevenly around the globe. It is now believed that these inequalities
cannot persist, as winds will act to continuously spread out the water
expansion. Of course, of global warming changes the strength and distribution
of the winds, then this ‘evening-out’ process may not occur, and the sea level
could rise more in some areas than others.

Questions 1 - 6

There are 8 paragraphs numbered 1 - 8 in Reading Passage. The first

paragraph and the last paragraph have been given headings.

From the list below numbered A - I, choose a suitable heading for the
remaining 6 paragraphs.

There are more headings than paragraphs, so you will not use all the
headings.

List of headings

A THE GYRE PRINCIPLE

B THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT
C HOW OCEAN WATERS MOVE
D STATISTICAL EVIDENCE
E THE ADVECTION PRINCIPLE
F DIFFUSION VERSUS ADVECTION
G FIGURING THE SEA LEVEL CHANGES
H ESTIMATED FIGURES
I THE DIFFUSION MODEL

J FUTURE OF THE OCEAN CURRENTS

Example: Paragraph 1: ……B……….

1. Paragraph 2……………..
2. Paragraph 3……………..
3. Paragraph 4……………..
4. Paragraph 5……………..
5. Paragraph 6……………..
6. Paragraph 7……………..

Question 7-10

Read each of the following statements, according to the information in the

reading passage.

Write:

T If it is true
F If it is false,
NG If there is no information about the statement in the reading passage.

7. The surface layer of the oceans is warmed by the atmosphere.

8. Advection of water changes heat and salt levels.
9. A gyre holds less heat than there is in the atmosphere.
10. The sea level is expected to rise evenly over the Earth's surface.

Your answers:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

IV. WRITING (50 points)

Part 1. Graph Description (20 points)

The bar chart below shows the popularity of well-known Instagram accounts in
2011 and 2021.

Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and
make comparisons where relevant. (20pts)
Part 2. Write an essay of about 250 words on the following topic. (30
points)

Some people think that a sense of competition in children should be

encouraged. Others believe that children who are taught to cooperate rather
than compete become more useful adults.

Give reasons to support your opinion and include any relevant examples from
your own experience or knowledge.

_______ THE END_______