Please bear with us, we’re out of bile

As if we all didn’t have enough issues about the ingredients in what we consume, now there’s bear bile to contend with. Or — in Hawaii, at least — maybe there isn’t.

House Bill 2296 has passed, banning the bear gallbladders and bile from the marketplace here. Those are ingredients in traditional-medicine and luxury-cosmetic items sold in Honolulu’s Chinatown, the Humane Society of the United States reports. American black bears are poached for gallbladders, and Asian bears are caged with catheters inserted to drain their bile, according to testimony.

It’s amazing to think about getting close enough to any bear to avoid the obvious and fatal reaction, but with the bile selling for thousands of dollars an ounce, there’s motivation.

iPads for students, teachers — and supervisors

Hawaii’s schools are finding more and more uses for the Apple iPad, the ubiquitous tablet computer. Ewa Makai Middle School put iPads to work in physical education classes, measuring fitness levels. At Mid-Pacific Institute, the tablets will be integrated into the full curriculum.

But they’re not just a new way for students to learn their lessons. They’re about to become a management tool. A donation by the Hawaii Business Roundtable will put 189 iPads, loaded with specialized software, into the hands of school administrators. They will use the iPads while observing teachers work as part of a new performance evaluation process, a pilot project at the state Department of Education.

It’s a whole new take on "computers in the classroom."