BIRMINGHAM, UK – At exactly 3.30pm Maria Burke made the day’s final address to her class of eight-year-olds reminding them to hand their homework in on time.

Five hours later she was up before a rather different audience — a crowd of businessmen watching her gyrate around a pole in skimpy underwear.

For 10 months the 28-year-old led a double life. She worked a full day at a Leicestershire primary school then went to her secret second job as a lap-dancer in a Birmingham nightclub.

But the long hours started to take their toll. And faced with the choice of earning £12,000 as a teacher or taking home six times as much from the sex industry, Maria opted for the latter. She has now “graduated” into porn movies, performing under the pseudonym of Jenny Loveitt.

“I sometimes miss teaching, but I’d never go back to it,” says Maria, who lives in South London. “I’m earning more money than I ever dreamed of and I’m proud of what I do.

“I’ve always loved sex and I’ve never been ashamed of my body. It makes sense for me to make use of my talents.”

Unfortunately her family don’t see it like that. She has been disowned by her middle-class parents, who are appalled at her choice of career. And her four younger sisters won’t speak to her.

“They can’t accept what I do,” says Maria. “It breaks my heart that I’m no longer in touch with my family. I have cried so many tears, wishing they would just take me for what I am. Maybe one day they will come round to my way of thinking, but for the moment they are ashamed of me.”

Her housewife mum Rosemary, 50, and her plumber dad James, 53, had high hopes for their brainy eldest daughter. So their disappointment that she is now a porn star is understandable.

Maria had shone at her Catholic comprehensive school in her hometown of Stoney Stanton in Leicestershire. She gained seven GCSEs and three A-levels, and later graduated from Lancaster University with a Music degree.

“Before then I had been shy and a bit of a loner,” she says. “But at university I came out of my shell. I had my first proper boyfriend and discovered sex – although I never imagined that would be the way I ended up making a living.”

After university she moved to London and was employed by a PR agency, but she later returned to Stoney Stanton to work in furniture sales. She wasn’t planning on staying for long, but then she fell in love with Lee Wilson, a worker in a printing factory who is three years her junior.

They set up home together, got married in July 2001 and talked about starting a family.

“At first, we lived happily,” says Maria. “But then we grew apart. I learned that I was likely to be infertile and that put an enormous pressure on us. Meanwhile, all Lee wanted to do was go to the pub or play football. And I wanted something different out of life.”

Then Lee admitted he had been having an affair with one of Maria’s friends and their marriage broke down.

At the time she was giving piano lessons to supplement her income. Seeking a new challenge, she decided to take up teaching full-time, even though it meant a £6,000 drop in salary.

“I thought, ‘I can’t have children, but at least I can work with them’,” she says. “I wanted to do something useful. Encouraging kids to learn and better themselves seemed like the answer.”

Maria signed up with the graduate teacher training registry and was placed at Westfield Primary School in Hinckley, Leicestershire.

“It was a hands-on job and I learned as I taught,” she says. “I used to look forward to seeing the children’s faces light up with excitement whenever they learned something new.

“It was so rewarding, but also exhausting. I had to be in school by 7am and didn’t leave until after 5pm. Evenings were spent marking or doing course work. But at the time it seemed worth the hassle. My parents were really proud of me and it helped me get over my split with Lee.”

Although the children were a joy to be with, the teachers were not. “They took against me,” says Maria.

“I think it was because I was young and attractive. They resented me because I hadn’t come into teaching through the traditional route and they’d criticize me in front of the class. In the end, I dreaded going into the staff room. They’d stop talking the moment I walked in. It was obvious they’d been gossiping about me.

“Had they known she was thinking of becoming a lap- dancer, they would have had something to gossip about.

Now that Maria was living on her own she was struggling to keep up her mortgage payments.

So when her friend Donna, who was working part-time as a lap-dancer, suggested that Maria do the same, she didn’t take much persuading.

“I’ve always enjoyed dancing and I didn’t see anything wrong with stripping,” she says.

“I practiced all the moves in front of my bedroom mirror and applied for an audition.”

She was hired by Peppermint Rhino in Birmingham and started working two evenings a week, earning £500 a night.

“It was fantastic,” recalls Maria. “I had no experience but they said I was a natural and I really looked forward to my slot.

“After a while, I realized I was getting more satisfaction out of lap-dancing than the teaching.

“I also loved the danger. I’d wonder if one of the kids’ dads would turn up, recognize me from parents’ evening and report me to the headmistress. It added to the excitement.”

The months went by and Maria managed to juggle both jobs. She insists that she was an attentive and caring teacher despite her long working day.

“The kids loved me,” she says with a smile. “They’d bring me drawings and little presents. One week I came back from lunch every day to find a cream cake on my desk. They were adorable.”

But things came to a head in December 2002 when a fellow teacher showed her up in front of her pupils. It was the final straw. She quit and later turned to lap- dancing full-time.

“I was sorry that things didn’t work out with my teaching, but I gave it my best shot,” she says. “I honestly think I would still be there now if it hadn’t been for those other uptight, stuffy teachers.”

Maria moved back to London, hired an agent and started doing porn films. “For me, the porn was a natural progression from lap-dancing,” she says.

“I am not bothered about being filmed having sex. It is something I enjoy so why shouldn’t I share it with others? And I don’t think it demeans women at all. In fact, it has empowered me and given me my independence.”

She now earns around £300 per “scene” when she is videoed having penetrative, oral and anal sex with individual men or groups of men and women.

The movies – with such titles as Rear Ender and Toys R Ass – are sold on the internet and in sex shops.

Maria must now have an Aids test every month.

“Industry rules” state that she must show a health certificate to her fellow performers proving that she is free of HIV and any other sexually-transmitted disease.

Condoms are rarely used.

On average she works for three days a week and earns around £50,000 a year.

She has also found love again with fellow porn star Mark Sloan, 35, and is now divorcing Lee.

“I don’t get self-conscious because I just regard it as my job,” says Maria.

“But I am a highly- sexed person and enjoy every minute. I always have an orgasm.

“Some women will find this hard to understand, but I can honestly have sex with any man. It’s the way I make my money and pay my rent. I never get emotionally involved.

“Making love to Mark is different because I love him. I don’t get jealous about him being with other women. He sees it as a job as much as I do.”

But Maria’s family were less than impressed when she finally confessed she made porn movies.

“My parents would ask what I was doing,” she says.

“I’d say I was doing PR work or some modeling. However, I hated lying and decided to put the record straight.”

Last June she made a special journey home to tell her mum and dad the truth.

Maria says: I said to my mother, ‘I’ve got something to tell you. I do naked pictures and rude films’.

“She was horrified and my dad just looked embarrassed.”

There was a furious row which ended with Maria leaving in tears. A few days later she got a text message from her sister Rebecca, 26.

“It said, ‘Mum and dad have told me to tell you not to contact them again. As far as they are concerned you no longer have a family. I just hope the money is worth it’,” she recalls.

“I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t expecting them to be proud of me, but I thought they might show me some love and support.”

Since then she has received two short and formal letters from her mother, but all her phone calls home have gone unanswered.

“My parents seem to perceive what I do as dirty and disgusting and it will take a lot to change their minds,” says Maria.

“I might not have become the highly- respected teacher they wanted me to be, but I’m still their daughter. One day, I hope they realize that.”