Rated X on Campus

Vita Excolatur is a pictorial and "literary" X-rated publication produced three times a year (since 2004) by the University of Chicago - and funded by $6,000 annually from student activities fees. (I really wish I'd gone to bed earlier instead of reading the paper...)

The emergence of college sex magazines such as the U. of C.'s -- which often are supported financially by student governments as recognized student organizations -- first started gaining national attention in 1999 when Vassar College students started a magazine called Squirm.

Since then, sex magazines have cropped up at elite institutions from Yale to Harvard to Boston University...

"The magazine talks about how to do it, when to do it, that it is OK to do it," added Sola Akintunde, the magazine's university adviser who also is the campus' assistant director of student activities. "It shows that being intellectual is attractive. They discuss everything from penis size to intimacy to safe sex; you name it."

If you're wondering where the university finds nude models, they're unpaid students...and they're not exposing just a little flesh...

Vita's most recent issue, published in May, has been its most risque yet, its editors say, with photographs that crossed the line set in previous editions, such as graphic photos of erections and sexual intercourse. Mielcarek and Rutherfurd said the latest issue represented a victory in their ongoing debates with university officials.

Said Dain Lewis, the student publisher of Sex Week at Yale: "Classiness is something we are extremely concerned about..."

Color me speechless.