Modern Santas Advise Children To Have Modest Expectations

The world's oldest and most famous school for Santa Clauses has modified its curriculum to adapt to the times.  In addition to teaching the Santas how to network using social media, they suggest advising children not to expect too many presents.
The result is a Christmas season in which Santas — including the 115 of them in this year’s graduating class of the Charles W. Howard Santa Claus School — must learn to swiftly size up families’ financial circumstances, gently scale back children’s Christmas gift requests and even how to answer the wish some say they have been hearing with more frequency — “Can you bring my parent a job?”

Santas here tell of children who appear on their laps with lists that include the latest, most expensive toys and their parents, standing off to the side, stealthily but imploringly shaking their heads no... Some children show up with elaborate printouts, cross-referenced spread sheets and clippings from catalogs. “I try to guide the children into not so unrealistic things, and I do tell them that Santa’s been cutting back too,” said Tom Ruperd, of Caro, Mich., who added that parents often silently signal their appreciation.

Additional details at the New York Times link.  And, in case you were wondering, "mall" Santas earn about $25-50 per hour.

Link.  Photo from the school's gallery.

Comments (2)

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Why does that first link go to page 2? It should be to the first page on http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/28/us/santas-taught-new-lessons-amid-economic-slump.html ... :P
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Hi,

I'm from germany, and I did not hear that in our news so I searched the web for a german speaking version... and there seames to be none.

I tracked this info down to a british website of the questionable newspaper "The Sun":
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2004092008,00.html

You can google the story in almost any language - except for german.
And everything you find bases on stories from UK.

is this a hoax made up by ALLAN HALL from The Sun? Or are german newspapers not interested in people eaten by spiders?
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Hmm, I think I'm skeptical about this one, too - not to be one of those nitpicky types, but I'm fairly certain that tarantulas don't actually spin webs ... Nevertheless it does make for interesting Sunday morning reading =)
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TOM's right. This story is a hoax. Germany has a famous tabloid. If this tabloid has not reported on that story, then it has been made up by the UK tabloid. Although BILD (the German tabloid) has been known to report hoaxes, too ...

And: geckos don't feast on rotten bodies.
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Btw, has anybody noticed that the article says that "the spiders and termites managed to escape when the heating elements exploded and opened the lids to their tanks"?

Sounds like those animals were kept in different tanks and that the heating elements exploded all at the same time? Doesn't sound logically.
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I have to call hoax too. Way too many things that don't make any sense. Giant webs draped all over him? To what purpose? What lizard would tear off flesh just to have it taken by a spider? And what spider would want dead flesh? No doubt. A fake story.
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I don't know if this is a hoax or not, but this "story" is... three years old!!!
It was reported on february 27th, 2004. You'll have to do a search on the archives for this one.
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No doubt, this is a hoax. I Live very close to dortmund, and i didnt hear anythung about that story. Like somebody wrote before, this seems to be a hoax originated by "the sun"...
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