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CORVALLIS - David Orr, an ecological literacy advocate, social critic, and award-winning author, will give a free public lecture at Oregon State University on Thursday, Jan. 17, in LaSells Stewart Center. Orr's talk, "Designing a World that Works," begins at 7 p.m.

Orr is chair of the Environmental Studies Program at Oberlin College in Ohio. Among his best known written works are "Ecological Literacy" and "Earth in Mind: Essays on Education, Environment and the Human Prospect." His forthcoming book, "The Nature of Design: Ecology, Culture and Human Intention," will be published by the Oxford University Press.

In 1993, Orr received the National Achievement Award from the National Wildlife Federation.

In his lecture, Orr will argue that the ecological crisis is partly a failure of education. Education in the modern world, he says, was designed to further the conquest of nature and the industrialization of the planet, and has tended to produce people tailored to fit these ends.

A long-time advocate of ecological literacy, Orr has written: "Education must have a different agenda, one designed to heal, connect, liberate, empower, create, and celebrate. It is time that we ask what we need to know to live humanely, peacefully, and responsibly on the earth."

During his OSU visit, Orr will lead a workshop on Friday, Jan. 18, at LaSells Stewart Center that will focus on organizing collaborative work groups or interest groups that emphasize sustainability and humans' relationship with the natural world. Co-directing the workshop with Orr will be Kathleen Dean Moore, director of the Spring Creek Project and a professor of philosophy at OSU, and Judith Musick, assistant director of the Center for the Study of Women in Society at the University of Oregon. The workshop is free and open to the public. It will begin at 10:30 a.m. and end following a noon lunch.

Orr's appearance is sponsored by The Spring Creek Project and the Center for Water and Environmental Sustainability at OSU. For more information, contact Tony Vogt at 541-737-6198.