Thursday's Extra Credit Reading

Calling all teachers: Not just one but two companies are pledging to give teachers a free ride to outer space. (I can think of one or two that I wouldn't mind seeing blasted into orbit.)

In Africa, scientists have found what they say may be the oldest known toddler ever documented. (I wonder where they bought their Huggies?)

Our Knucklehead Of The Day is former Georgia Alabama teacher Steve White, who self-terminated his teaching career by showing his 8th grade students internet material that was both politically volatile and sexually-explicit. But it gets worse. This clown individual was also on the ballot as the Democratic candidate for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives!

Fundraising for schools takes many creative forms, but who would have thought that wine tasting would be one of them? (It's said that we do things differently out here in California, but even I didn't know that we did things that differently.)

In a New Hampshire elementary school, they're embroiled in the type of controversy that one doesn't see every day. Key vocabulary needed: pink-and-green swastika, third-grader, parents, censorship and principal.

The local New York City teacher's union (UFT/AFT) is sounding the clarion call for folks to show their support for striking Mexican teachers by gathering in front of the local Mexican consulate today. (See the gripping backstory of this bitter strike here.)

Today's "why me?" story has got to be that of Florida superintendent Jim Paul, who was forced to fire a 46-year-old English teacher due to an alleged affair with an 18-year-old female student. The teacher that Paul was forced to dismiss just happened to be a long-time close personal friend.

Natural gas is fueling school upgrades in Wyoming, where they "have money to burn." We think that it's nice to see that someone besides the energy companies are benefitting from all those windfall profits.

Joanne Jacobs posts about some British moms who are circumventing their local school's healthy foods initiative by selling "unhealthy" meals directly to children through the school's fence.

California's governator governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed a first-in-the-country law protecting college newspapers from being censored by school administration. (I guess that'll make the 'ole CensorChimps howl with frustration...) ----------------------------See our latest EduPosts here and yesterday's Extra Credit Reading over there.