Mike Richardson and Sarah WinchHe’s slimy, his brain is small, and he halts education. Great crested newt, or Republican congressman?
The British town of Corby was set to open a shiny new elementary school next fall, but instead, students will have to make do with a refurbished wing of the old school building. Construction on the Corby Primary Academy is on hold indefinitely because of newts.
Great crested newts are endangered, and U.K. law prohibits disturbing their habitat. Now that the newts have been discovered on the planned build site, construction can’t go ahead until wildlife experts decide how and where to relocate the newts. Meanwhile, 60 kindergarteners and 30 first- and second-graders (roughly; they do grades differently in England) will be housed in a gussied-up remnant of the Exeter Primary School, which the new school was supposed to replace. Due to constrained space, the school won’t accept third through sixth grade students as planned.
If you want to know more about the great crested newt, well, it’s British and it’s a newt, so we figure it’s like this:
Yikes. Probably just as well they’re not exposing the children to that.
