Talk:Australian school at center of child-sex allegations pulls newsletter mentioning 'Penthouse' as recommended reading

Original Reporting
This report is based on a chat to a parent of a student at the school, looking at metadata of the published Adobe PDF documents and conducting a telephone interview with the school's principal - Cartman02au (Talk)(AU Portal) 03:48, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Telephone Interview
I conducted a telephone interview with Mr John Edwards, Principal of St Stanislaus College today at 11:25AM. Consent was not given by the school receptionist for the call to be recorded.

The principal was asked why the original newsletter dated 22/8/2008 was removed from the school's website and replaced with another version. Mr Edwards asked if I was referring to "the removal of a paragraph mentioning a girl magazine", I responded in the affirmative.

Mr Edwards said he had deemed that section of the newsletter "unacceptable as it was widely interpreted as a girl magazine". When I asked whether or not the authors intention was to mention penthouse, Mr Edward replied "the question was completed prior to that staff member going on long service leave, it has peCENSORED listed and se was added to the end as humour, it has since been found to be unacceptable" - Cartman02au (Talk)(AU Portal) 01:36, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

John Edwards
It is quite obvious, but I feel that this "John Edwards" should be clearly distinguished apart from the U.S. politician-- especially considering his recent sex scandal. -- Poe Joe (Talk) 05:41, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Do you consider The schools principal John Edwards told Wikinews that the newsletter was changed after Mr. MacDougall's answer was "widely interpreted to mean a girl magazine". Mr Edwards said he deemed the original comments "unacceptable". to not be clear enough? I would assume (and may be incorrect with my assumption) that if we were talking about John Edwards being the principal we would of mentioned the fact that he was 2004 US Presidential Candidate - Cartman02au (Talk)(AU Portal) 07:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

HSIE
After a quick WP search, I came to the conclusion that it means "Human Society and its Environment," but others may not know that, if that is even correct. Also, long term service leave? Thanks, —Calebrw (talk) 16:46, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Regarding your comments
It is true that some Australian schools have a rather collective "HSIE" subject, which does indeed stand for "Human Society and its Environment," especially in Catholic schools (I only happen to know this since I went to a Catholic school before high school). From my memory this encompassed mainly Geography and History, though there was a social studies aspect to it as well.

Long Term Service Leave is an entitlement that comes with employment in Australia. Can't bother going into the details, but after you have served for a certain number of years you're entitled to a certain number of (can't remember if it's paid, but I'm pretty sure it is) weeks holiday as a reward for long term service. Teachers often get to take advantage of this due to the rather permanent nature of their jobs.124.170.249.213 12:31, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Nature of the newsletter
Who produces this newsletter? I mean, it is obvious the school publishes it, but is it a student-written newsletter? The section where Ian MacDougall makes the controversial recommendation looks like the kind of interview a student newspaper would conduct of a teacher. If it is just a teacher trying to show he is "cool" at an all-boys school, that severely undermines it as an official "recommendation" for reading. In another question MacDougall complains that a girlfriend wrecked his first car. --SVTCobra 22:19, 28 August 2008 (UTC)


 * By the way, the cached version at xenware.net now matches the official one on the school website. Maybe it should be removed from sources as it no longer seems useful. --SVTCobra 22:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the headline of the article
The headline seems to make out that the school made some sort of list which literally recommended 'Penthouse' to be read. The actual article was simply a rather inappropriate attempt at humour from one of the teachers. While I believe in public education over private, I think it rather unfair to be slandering this school over the actions of a single priest and a misinterpreted attempt at humour. 124.170.249.213 12:38, 30 August 2008 (UTC)