From today's UK papers

The Independent

Poor teaching standards in colleges are hampering the government's attempt to give a second chance in education to thousands of teenagers, the standards watchdog Ofsted has said.

The Guardian

An alarming rise in the number of children attempting suicide was reported by the charity ChildLine in a report on the extremes of despair being caused by bullying, sexual and physical abuse, bereavement and exam stress.

The first farmers may have started work 13,000 years ago — more than 25 centuries earlier than first thought, according to archaeologists from University College London, Oxford and Rochester, US.

The Daily Telegraph

A contraceptive "pill" that men cannot forget to take and could remain effective for three years is being developed in Britain by the Centre for Reproductive Endocrinology.

Bernard King, vice-chancellor of Abertay Dundee, replies to criticisms of his university's BA (Hons) in golf tourism.

The Financial Times

Black Americans have become more pessimistic about race relations over the past four years, reversing a 35-year trend, according to a study by the Gallup Organisation.

New technologies, including controversial genetically modified foods, could be vital to developing countries trying to improve living standards, according to the United Nations.

The Times

An Iranian asylum seeker has won a place at Peterhouse, Cambridge, two years after arriving in the country unable to speak English.

A heavily reworked draft of one of the final chapters of James Joyce's Ulysses was sold for £861,250 to a private buyer at a Sotheby's auction yesterday.

Miscellany

Tony Blair yesterday announced he was setting up a new "over-arching" Cabinet committee on domestic affairs to strengthen his control of Labour's second-term agenda. ( Financial Times, Daily Telegraph )

Babies can recognise tunes they have heard in the womb even a year after birth, say scientists at the University of Leicester. ( Guardian, Independent )

Popular herbal medicines, including ginkgo, ginsing and garlic, can cause complications in surgery, a study from the University of Chicago has found. ( Daily Telegraph, Times )

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