Nutbars near and far.

1. Tom Cruise is an idiot. Now he thinks he should eat the placenta after wife-to-be Katie gives birth to their child (silently, of course). [Here's the story. Warning: includes a graphic photo.]

EDIT: apparently, he was just kidding. He's still an idiot, though.

2. Locally, school trustee John Young wants to remove the grade "F" from the school district, because it "preconditions children to further failures." What-evar. He thinks we should better define failure before attaching a grade -- but we do have a definition: the Student Reporting Policy of the BC Ministry of Education refers educators to the Provincial Letter Grades Order (pdf) which defines an F as

"(Failing.) The student has not demonstrated, or is not demonstrating, the minimally acceptable performance in relation to the expected learning outcomes for the course or subject and grade."

(full info from the BC Ministry of Education). For Grades 11 and 12, that also translates to any mark below 50%. It's bad enough that they removed letter grades from the early primary grades (letter grades begin in grade 4), and that they basically will not hold back any student, even if they are failing. So how the hell can a parent accurately gague their child's progress? Aw, hell, I could rant all day about this issue -- it's the main reason why I initially wanted to homeschool kiddo -- and if cashflow allows it, I still might.



tags: idiots, celebrities, education