We may not know for sure whether Elin Woods will soon be filing for divorce, but she is moving on with her life. Radar Online reports that she’s taking a college night course this summer at a small liberal arts school near her home in Orlando, Florida. They also have more background on Elin, 30. While I’d heard that she was a nanny to a Swedish golfer when Tiger met her I didn’t know that she was working at a clothing shop in Stockholm when she met the golfer’s wife. She also supposedly wanted to become a child psychologist, so maybe she’s on her way. Elin has been married to Cheetah for six years and is mom to daughter Sam, three, and Charlie, 15 months.

The beautiful blonde started school on Monday night at [a school in] Florida and RadarOnline.com captured exclusive video of her on campus.

The school is just outside of Orlando and is a small private liberal arts school…

Before meeting Tiger she attended Lund University in Sweden.

As her relationship with Tiger has unraveled, Elin has demonstrated more and more independence. She has taken four trips away from him in the past five weeks and is living in a house she rented approximately a mile away from the home they once shared.

Her decision to go back to school came after a conversation with one of her nannies, who revealed that she was enrolled at [the school].

That prompted Elin to explore taking a class in the summer session, which started Monday.

Leaving the children with Tiger, Elin took off from her home Monday and arrived at [the school] in plenty of time for the start of her 6 pm class.

After attending Lund University, Elin worked in a Stockholm clothing store. That’s where she met the wife of Swedish golf star Jesper Parnevik. Mia Parnevik hired her as a nanny to their children.

While working for the Parneviks, Elin met Tiger, who pursued her relentlessly and even enlisted Jesper’s help to get Elin to date him.

Since Tiger’s secret cheating life has been revealed Jesper has said that Tiger is no longer welcome in his home.

Before marrying Tiger, Elin wanted to become a child psychologist. Her father was a successful journalist as served as Washington bureau chief for a Swedish broadcasting company. Her mother Barbro Holmberg is a government minister.

[From Radar Online]

I guess this means that Elin is staying put in Florida for the summer while she takes this course. Sadly Radar published the name of the college and the exact day and time that Elin will be there. There will be a ton of paparazzi there next week and this could discourage her from completing her studies. Elin is a tough one, though, and I bet she’ll stick it out. Good for her for expanding her horizons.

Meanwhile Tiger is next scheduled to play the U.S. open on June 17, the AT&T National on July 1 and the British Open on July 15. He dropped out of the Players Championship two weeks ago, citing an injured neck that he denies is at all connected to his car accident in late November. Doctors note that Tiger’s injury is consistent with whiplash. He has a tough journey ahead of him and it’s doubtful that he’ll return to his former glory after all this, but we’ll see.

I don’t know if this is true or not, but either way it’s food for thought. Supposedly Brooke Shields, who has played Miley Cyrus’ deceased mom in cameos on Hannah Montana, is urging the smack-talking singer/actress to make something of herself and go to college. Brooke graduated from Princeton with a degree in French literature in 1987. She doesn’t really seem to use it in her line of work, but it was a growing experience for sure and who knows how she would have turned out if she didn’t go to school and apply herself. Miley is said to be on board and to be considering college. Of course this news is in Star Magazine, so it could be total speculation. Star reported last year that Miley wasn’t considering college, but that could have changed.

Brooke Shields plays Miley Cyrus’ mom on Hannah Montana, but she’s also cast herself as the teen’s college counselor! “Brooke’s been pushing Miley to go to college,” a source tells Star of the Princeton grad. “She says she needs something to fall back on.” And though home-schooled Miley loves living the rock life, the source says the 17-year-old is considering applying in 2010. “She’d love to be an Ivy Leaguer like Brooke!”

[From Star Magazine, print edition, January 11, 2009]

Miley has mentioned that she’d like to go to college, and once said she was interested in studying photography in London. She’s 17 and is around the age when she should be considering higher education. As a role model to countless young women, Miley would be setting a great example by going to college. She has two films in development and her movie The Last Song, with boyfriend Liam Hemsworth, is out in April. She also has another final season of Hannah Montana coming up. If Miley is serious about going to college she’ll have to make time for it. With all the opportunities she has I doubt she’ll bother.

Photos are stills from Hannah Montana

In the wake of a rather embarrassing photo of “Spiderman” actor James Franco sleeping during one of his classes at Columbia University, seniors at UCLA are starting a Facebook-based campaign protesting their school’s decision to have Franco serve as this year’s graduation speaker. Though the actor is a UCLA alum and has been enjoying a successful career while attending Columbia, the UCLA students feel he is not an appropriate choice to address the class as they embark into adulthood.

When James Franco wakes up from his mid-lecture nap at Columbia, he’ll find out he’s been selected to speak at the upcoming UCLA graduation ceremony — and some of the students couldn’t be more pissed off!!

Some bitter Bruins launched the “UCLA Students Against James Franco as Commencement Speaker” group on Facebook, attacking the actor’s “wisdom” — or lack thereof — because he only graduated from the school last year.

The group, already 210 members strong, states “Clearly, this is ridiculous. Anyone who has been in his classes knows he is an average student.” They also claim Franco lacks “the wisdom and perspective such a speaker is meant to provide the graduates.”

At the end of their digi-rant, the group does throw Franco a bone, saying “He is a very talented actor, and clearly did well enough at UCLA to get into Columbia. We merely protest that he is not an appropriate choice for our graduation speaker.”

We didn’t call Franco for comment, because we didn’t want to wake him up.

[From TMZ]

What difference does it make how long ago someone graduated? Since leaving UCLA, the guy isn’t doing too shabby – he starred in all three Spiderman movies – one of the most commercially successful superhero franchises of all time. He co-starred with Sean Penn in the Oscar-nominated “Milk.” He also got to be very, very funny in the hit comedy “Pineapple Express.” Clearly, the kid is doing something right, even if he hasn’t been out of school for long. Maybe he doesn’t have the life and business experience of someone like Bill Gates, but I’d certainly be interested in any advice he could give me if I were about to leave college. As for his falling asleep in class…well, all I can say is, been there, done that. I was just lucky enough not to have my picture taken when it happened.

Above, James Franco laughs at Jon Stewart during the Academy Awards. Below, Franco accepts an Independent Spirit Award for his work in “Milk.” Photos: WENN.

I love it when celebrities embrace higher education. Especially when they do it under the radar, or years later than most. Like when Rivers Cuomo of Weezer graduated from Harvard, more than ten years from when he started. Or news that Shakira was taking classes at UCLA and no one even realized who she was. When I was in college Duff McKagan of Guns N’ Roses and Velvet Revolver was in my art history class, and was about to finish his degree in finance. I am a huge fan of smart celebrities.AQQ

Though I don’t think there’s any comprehensive list of the smartest celebs out there, if there were I’m pretty sure Queen founder and guitarist Brian May would be near the top. May just finished publishing his doctoral thesis in astrophysics. I’m going to just give you a little bit of the highlights, since I have no idea what any of it means. Which tells you something about the usefulness of my degree.

The founder of the legendary rock band Queen has completed his doctoral thesis in astrophysics after taking a 30-year break to play some guitar.

Brian May’s thesis examines the mysterious phenomenon known as Zodiacal light, a misty diffuse cone of light that appears in the western sky after sunset and in the eastern sky before sunrise… May’s work focuses on an instrument that recorded 250 scans of morning and evening Zodiacal light between 1971 and 1972. The Fabry-Perot Spectrometer is located at the Observatorio del Teide at Izana in Tenerife, the largest of the Canary Islands.

The completed thesis appears as the book “A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud” (Springer and Canopus Publishing Ltd., 2008).

“I have thoroughly enjoyed my years playing guitar and recording music with Queen, but it’s extremely gratifying to see the publication of my thesis,” May said. “I’ve been fascinated with astronomy for years, and I was happy to finally complete my Ph.D. last year and record my studies of the Zodiacal Light in this book.”

[From Live Science]

For any of you science-y sorts, I bet you were just really impressed. For you liberal arts/soft science people like myself, I bet you were just really confused/impressed in theory. Though I don’t understand a word of it, I’ve got to say it’s pretty impressive for a guy to still care enough about astrophysics and academia to keep working on his PhD after thirty years.

Here’s Brian May appearing at the ’46664′ concert honoring Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday at Hyde Park in London on June 27th. Photographer: Danny Clifford; Images thanks to WENN.

Kevin Spacey has kept a relatively low profile in the last few years, choosing to focus on theater instead of movies. Since 2003 he has been the artistic director of London’s Old Vic Theatre, after directing its opening production of Cloaca. Since then Spacey – born in New Jersey – has spent most of his time in London. It seems that he’s been very much accepted by the Brits, as the University of Oxford just named Spacey its Cameron Mackintosh Visiting Professor of Contemporary Theater.

Spacey will succeed Shakespearean actor and “Star Trek: The Next Generation” star Patrick Stewart when the new academic year starts in October. Previous holders of the post, endowed by theater impresario Mackintosh, include composer Stephen Sondheim, playwright Alan Ayckbourn and actress Diana Rigg.

In a statement, Spacey said he was delighted to be appointed to the one-year post, which requires him to give lectures, workshops and seminars at the 800-year-old university.

“It really is an honor for me to have been invited to follow such illustrious names and take up this role at Oxford,” Spacey said. “The university is steeped in tradition and has a great heritage in the arts, and I look forward to working with the students and staff.”

The college’s master, Roger Ainsworth, said Spacey was “a truly international star and will bring an enormous wealth of talent and experience in both film and theater to bear on the role. He will be a huge draw for the student population of Oxford and to the wider public, too,” Ainsworth said.

[From the Huffington Post]

Talk about taking your craft seriously. As prestigious as it is to win an Academy Award (Spacey’s won two), being asked to teach at Oxford is even more of an honor. Though I don’t think it comes with anything shiny that you can stick on your mantel. What an awesome tribute to Spacey’s skills, and an exciting way for his students to spend the next year.

Here are Kevin Spacey and Benicio Del Toro at the Raisa Gorbachev Foundation Third Annual Gala Dinner at Hampton Court Palace in London, England on June 7th. Images thanks to WENN.

Paul McCartney’s life gets better every day. First he got Heather Mills officially out of his life. Now the former Beatle has been awarded an honorary Doctor of Music degree from Yale. It’s really challenging to say which one of those things is a greater accomplishment. But I’m guessing as far as the day-to-day goes, not having to look at Heather Mills’ gaping maw probably brings Paul the most pleasure.

Paul McCartney can now add one more honor to the numerous awards, accolades and the knighthood he has already received. The ex-Beatle on Monday was awarded an honorary Doctor of Music degree from Yale University.

In granting the honorary degree to McCartney — Sir Paul McCartney since he was knighted in 1996 — the university said no one compares with the legendary songwriter.

Yale said the 65-year-old McCartney awakened a generation, giving a fresh sound to rock, roll, rhythm and blues.

[From the Associated Press]

More than 1000 students cheered for McCartney when he was awarded his degree. He looks pretty darn adorable – and quite pleased – in the photos from the event. If anyone deserves such a degree, it’s Sir Paul McCartney, PhD. That’s a lot of letters. Congratulations to him.

Images thanks to Splash.

Vanessa Williams, famous Ugly Betty actress, formerly disgraced Miss America, and singer of that one song in the early nineties, is finally getting her college degree. In 1983 Williams dropped out of Syracuse University after two years. She won the Miss America crown shortly after, and had to give it back after naked photos of her were published in Penthouse. Luckily Ms. Williams didn’t let some boobs keep her down, and she’s gone on to have a pretty successful career. Now, 25 years later, she’s getting her college degree, thanks in part to credit earned on the stage and screen.

Nearly 25 years after leaving Syracuse University, Vanessa Williams will get her bachelor of fine arts degree this weekend. The 45-year-old actress-singer, who stars in ABC’s “Ugly Betty,” will also deliver the convocation address Saturday to graduates of Syracuse’s College of Visual and Performing Arts.

Williams attended Syracuse’s drama department as a musical theater major from 1981-1983. She earned the remaining credits for her degree through industry experience and performances on stage and screen.

In 1983, Williams became the first black Miss America. She surrendered the title in July 1984 after Penthouse magazine published nude, sexually explicit photographs of her taken several years earlier.

Over her career, Williams has sold more than 4 million albums, won critical praise for her performances on Broadway, made dozens of TV appearances and starred in several movies. She has won a Tony, received two NAACP Image Awards and nine Grammy nominations. In 1996, Williams received the George Arents Pioneer Medal, the university’s most prestigious alumni award.

[From the Huffington Post]

I think that’s pretty cool. I really love it when celebrities actually go back to classes to finish their degrees – but it certainly seems fair to give a BFA to an actress, since theater work would have been a requirement for her anyway. I always think it’s a little unfair when universities give honorary degrees. It seems unjust that the rest of us had to work so hard for the same thing. Many schools do it in order to get someone famous to speak at their commencement, which I think cheapens the degree and the school’s reputation. But it seems to be a pretty common thing anymore.

Regardless, Vanessa Williams attended classes for two years and worked in the field of her major, so the university gave her actual credits, and her degree isn’t honorary. Congratulations to her and the rest of this year’s graduates.

Here’s Vanessa Williams with Michael Bolton and Jane Krakowski at the2008 Lincoln Center Annual Spring Gala in New York City on April 9th. Images thanks to PR Photos.

A lot of people would probably like to ban Brooke Hogan from being within 100 yards of them. I sure would. Imagine if the whole world could get a restraining order against her. How glorious that would be. Well three Florida universities have managed to ban her – or at least deny her admission to their fine academic halls. I know, I’m jealous too. I wish I could not just ban Brooke from places but also banish her to places – several volcanic, deserted islands come to mind.

Brooke, 19, wants to film her family’s crap-ass reality show Hogan Knows Best on campus – and in the classroom – thus totally disrupting the lives of the thousands of other students for her benefit. Luckily the first three schools she applied to were smart enough to say no.

Hoping to film the VH1 reality show Hogan Knows Best with a nine-camera-wielding production team, the young member of the wrestler’s family was denied admission at those institutions [the University of South Florida, Florida State University and the University of Central Florida] out of concerns that she and her crew might disrupt the others students’ academic lives, the Palm Beach Post reports.

The upshot was, on Tuesday and Wednesday, Hogan (real name: Brooke Ellen Bollea) went to the southeast coast of the Sunshine State and toured the campus of Florida Atlantic University – where she met with Student Government president Tony Teixeira and sorority and fraternity members, as well as tooled around the grounds on two golf carts hired by the show.

No decision has been made regarding Hogan’s permission to film on campus – or even if she’ll be admitted as a student, says the newspaper, which does quote FAU spokeswoman Kristine McGrath as saying, “The university would not agree to an arrangement that would be disruptive to the academic setting.”

[From People]

All three of the universities that declined to accept Brooke said they declined to accept her because they don’t want a show filmed on their campus and in their classrooms. But here’s what confuses me: if Brooke applied to these schools and had grades good enough to get in, wouldn’t she have been accepted – but just told that she couldn’t film there? Something makes me think this is just some PR on the part of the Hogan family to cover up for Brooke not getting accepted into all three schools that she’s been blabbing about.

Here’s Brooke Hogan about to bust out of her top in a super classy dress at the Grammys on February 10th. Does she really look 19 to you? Images thanks to PR Photos.

Actor Kal Penn from the Harold & Kumar movies is working a guest lecturer in Asian American studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He teaches two courses, “Images of Asian Americans in the Media,” and “Contemporary American Teen Films.” Penn has an undergraduate degree in sociology from the University of California and is working on a graduate certificate in international security from Stanford.

Penn contacted the department after he gave a speech for the college during Asian Pacific American Heritage week. Somehow a deal was reached to hire him, and while the director of the Asian American Studies program will not reveal Penn’s salary it is thought to be more than an average guest lecturer. He’s not doing it for the money, but it’s not a pittance either:

[Asian American Studies program director] Kao would not reveal how much more it cost to hire Penn versus the average adjunct professor, but he said that the Asian American Studies Program contributed a significant portion of its yearly budget, as did the Cinema Studies department contributed funding.

Penn is “really doing this because he wants to. He’s not going to get rich doing this,” Kao added.

The ASAM Program is relatively small, and students and administrators say that Penn’s arrival could increase its prominence.

“Kal Penn coming to Penn for a semester is going to be huge for the ASAM program,” College sophomore Rahima Dosani wrote in an e-mail.

[From the Daily Pennsylvanian]

A lot of students signed up for Penn’s class due to his celebrity status, but he says his popularity only goes so far when it comes to showing up for class and doing the work. Penn told MTV news that a lot of students dropped his class when they realized how early it was: “It’s a Monday, early morning class and there’s a lot of reading and papers, so a lot of people dropped the class.” [via Contact Music]

The University of Pennsylvania was hoping that Penn’s guest lecturing gig would bring more attention to the Asian American studies department, and it surely did, but it seems it didn’t take long for students to realize that a famous teacher doesn’t necessarily make a class easier. I tried to take “Blacks in Films” when I was in college and the requirements were too hard so I dropped it. Entertainment-related subject matter doesn’t make a class any less demanding.

SFGate has an article about pop culture university classes, and they include `”The Simpsons: Sitcom as Political and Social Satire,” and “Droppin’ Science: Critical Essays on Rap Music and Hip Hop Culture” at UC Berkeley.

Kal Penn is currently starring in Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, which is out in the US on 4/25/08. Here’s the trailer. Warning NSFW language and adult subject matter.

Though she’s used to spending much more time at the Ivy than at the Ivy League, Paris Hilton actually spent a little time at Harvard University yesterday. Yes THAT Harvard, not some bar or club that has a tricky name. And to further confuse your view of the fundamentals of world order, Paris was given an award. I’m pretty sure it’s the first one she’s ever gotten – you know she wasn’t event the kid that got the lame “Honorable Mention” award at the third grade science fair. Paris was awarded the Harvard Lampoon Humor Magazine’s Woman of the Year award. And she actually looked pretty cute… at least for Paris Hilton. She had a wry smile on her face that made me think she almost understood the joke. Almost. Because then she spoke.

Harvard University loves Paris Hilton. “Harvard is hot!” the 26-year old heiress proclaimed Wednesday as she posed for pictures holding a giant, oversized trophy on the steps of the Lampoon Castle in Cambridge Massachusetts.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine standing here, standing on the steps of the Harvard Lampoon,” Hilton said. “It’s really exciting and I’ve had such a great time.”

The Lampoon award is a spoof of the annual honors given by Harvard’s Hasty Pudding Theatericals. Paris currently stars in the upcoming film The Hottie and the Nottie, which hits theaters on Friday. Hilton, who arrived an hour late for the festivities, told the crowd of about 100 people that her Simple Life Star, Nicole Richie, was also with her, then added: “Just kidding!”

[From OK! Magazine]

It’s too bad Paris made such lame jokes. This would have been the perfect opportunity for her to spend a few hundred bucks and hire someone to ghostwrite something funny for her, and actually pleasantly surprise everyone. She was gracious and seemed to enjoy herself. I’m guessing Paris capped off the closest thing she’s ever had to a college experience by playing some ultimate Frisbee on the quad and sleeping with a guy she later regretted.

Picture Note by JayBird: Images thanks to Splash.