Watercooler Stories

Teacher shows porn clip in sex ed class

COPENHAGEN, Denmark, May 30 (UPI) -- An eighth-grade Danish schoolteacher, who showed a 10-minute film clip of two adults having oral sex, has been reported to police.

The teacher, who was teaching a class in sex education on sexuality and puberty, is reported to have also shown her students pictures from a pornographic magazine, according to the Frederiksborg Amts Avis newspaper.

The teacher, whose name has not been made public, has been removed as a sex education teacher, but some parents want the teacher removed permanently from the school because students say she continues to mention sexual issues in other subjects she teaches, reported the Copenhagen Post Sunday.

The school's principal had reprimanded the teacher immediately after the incident -- not for showing the adult material, but because it could be considered a copyright violation.

Charity wristbands made by 'slave labor'

LONDON, May 30 (UPI) -- The very wristbands used to raise awareness and funds against world poverty are made in Chinese sweatshops, under "slave labor" conditions, an audit found.

The wristbands, made of fabric or silicon and worn by politicians, actors, pop stars and professional athletes, are part of the Make Poverty History campaign created by a coalition of more than 400 British charities.

An "ethical audit" obtained by the Sunday Telegraph alleged Chinese factories making the silicon versions use "forced labor" by taking "financial deposits" from new employees in violation of Chinese law and the Ethical Trading Initiative.

The audit also found workers paid at below the local minimum hourly wage, poor health and safety provisions, long hours, a seven-day work week, inadequate insurance and no vacation.

"This is appalling. It goes against everything we stand for," said musician Bob Geldof, who has raised money for famine victims and worked to eradicate world hunger. "If we are criticizing big companies for trading unethically then we have to be whiter than white."

Principals may do away with valedictorian

MIAMI, May 30 (UPI) -- Miami-area principals are so fed up with the tactics used by some students to boost their grade points, they're considering doing away with the valedictorian.

"The val-sal issue has become about who has the best strategy," Miami-Dade School Board member Ana Rivas Logan said.

It seems some students will do just about anything to boost a GPA, from taking advanced classes over the Internet to switching to schools with a lower-scoring top student.

The National Association for College Admission Counseling told the Miami Herald colleges are less concerned these days with class rank than they are with the types of classes students take.

Subway ads to be used to recruit priests

LONDON, May 30 (UPI) -- In an effort to recruit more Roman Catholic priests in Britain, the church plans to use beer coasters in pubs and London subway posters.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor said changes are in store for his Westminster Diocese and that in addition to the recruitment campaign, he plans to tells his churchgoers that the sharp decline in priests will result in some parishes coping without a resident priest and laypeople given more responsibilities, the BBC reported Sunday.

If the changes are well received in Westminster, the seat of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, similar changes will be made in other British parishes, according to the cardinal.

The number of priests at Westminster has fallen from 850 in 1990 to 600 this year and is expected to decline to 470 in the next 10 years.