Contact:  Rick Peterson, Manager of News Services, 920/832-6590
For Immediate Release				June 15, 1999

New Millennium Focus of Area Educators in Lawrence's Mielke Summer Institute 
 
APPLETON, WIS. -- The advent of a new millennium poses challenges and
opportunities beyond those associated with the ballyhooed Y2K computer
problem, none perhaps greater than those dealing with education. 

     Starting June 21, 27 educators from the Appleton and Shawano school
districts will reflect on the upcoming historical moment in "The Millennium:
Just Another Deadline," at the Mielke Summer Institute in the Liberal Arts at
Lawrence University.
     Led by five members of the Lawrence faculty, the week-long program is
designed to foster critical thinking on the changing millennium through an
interdisciplinary approach.  The goal of the program, now in its fourth year,
is to provide collaborative approaches to teaching that can be implemented in
their own schools and classrooms.
     "The last half of the title of this summer's theme, 'just another
deadline,' conveys the point that should be kept in mind amidst all the
millennialist hype, hoopla and prophesies of doom," said Stewart Purkey,
associate professor of education at Lawrence and director of the Mielke
Education Program.  "Nevertheless, it is always worthwhile to consider where 
we have been as a people and as a planet, and where both of us might be
going -- presumably together.
     "Ultimately, the Summer Institute benefits Appleton and Shawano
students through its effects on the educators who take part in it," Purkey
added.  "In the short run, however, it really is fun.  For an educator,
what's better than talking about important ideas and issues with bright,
curious and enthusiastic folks?" 
     Teachers participating in this summer's institute will examine
millennium-related issues through the perspectives of education, religion,
geology, history and art.  Discussion topics include:
     > the continuing tension between equity and excellence reflected in our
understanding of what schools do or should do in light of the sweeping
demographic changes affecting the nation at the close of the millennium. 
     > religious expression in antiquity, the manner in which early
religious views conveyed a sense of the order of the world and how
apocalyptic thinking reflects one of the models in antiquity and serves as
the antithesis of the other.
     > how, in the context of geologic time, is irrelevant and arbitrary,
but how emerging geo-biological models such as the Gaia hypothesis hold the
key to a richer understanding of Earth and our place on it. 
     > the concept of "modernity" as seen through the eyes of the late
French intellectual Michael Foucault.
     > the role of art in promoting social change and the creative use of
public space to foster increased public participation in the art-making
process.  
     Joining Purkey as 1999 summer institute leaders will be Lawrence
faculty members Paul Cohen, associate professor of history and author of
"Freedom's Moment: An Essay on the French Concept of Liberty;" Helen
Klebesadel, associate professor of art and nationally recognized watercolor
painter; Marcia Bjornerud, associate professor of geology and director of
Lawrence's environmental studies program; and Kathy Kueny, assistant
professor of religious studies and a specialist in religion and violence.
     The Mielke Summer Institute in the Liberal Arts was established in 1996 as
part of a $1.25 million gift to Lawrence from the Mielke Family Foundation,
Inc. of Appleton.  Participants are selected by committee through a competitive
application process.  In addition to the summer program, the foundation's gift
also established a series of seminars organized around issues affecting
education at the local, state and national levels known as the Mielke Forums on
Education.