E M B R A C I N G  T H E  E A R T H

• 1,000 days of global environmental awareness and action

  EE.ICRO^TM Embracing the Earth is an environmental awareness action project which began on April 6, exactly 1,000 days before the year 2000, and which will culminate in a large global celebration on First Night 2000. Its main goal is to connect children world-wide in a common action to create a vision for a better and brighter future for all of us.

  The project uses the Internet, generally believed to be the least expensive vehicle for global communication, although the project will also include those children without access to the Internet. By the close of the 1,000 day period, it is hoped that the project will have built a strong network of children world-wide who will be able to fully benefit from the new information technology and share an interest in working with each other toward common, global goals. The EE.ICRO^TM Embracing the Earth project will include the following components:

• A Millennium Quilt, a 'virtual' gallery of children's drawings representing their visions of the world in which they wish to live in the future.
• Necklaces of Friendship, composed of beads that children send to each other in various countries as symbols of their wish and commitment to learn about each other's cultures.
• A Dancing Necklace, which will be presented during a common celebration of the First Night 2000, representing a commitment to finding common solutions at the global celebration.

  The project is headed by Marta Vahtar of the ICRO-Institute for Integral Development and Environment located in Domzale, Slovenia, in collaboration with Gorazd Barbic and Ales Lipuscek from RIDMC, Ljubljana, Slovenia, and Caryn Johnson and Linda Heald who are members of Earth Day Greater Boston, Boston, US.

  Organizers have received inquiries about the project from several schools already and organizers would like to invite partners from different countries to join the initiative. The commitment expected from partners includes translating the project's home page into their own language, presenting the project to primary school children and to their mentors, and assisting children and their mentors with the Internet and computers.

  The project's home page is now available in Slovenian and English (http://www.ljudmila.org/ee.icro and http://www.kud-fp.si/ee.icro) and will soon be available in Romanian. For more information, contact ICRO@guest.arnes.si.