Professor of Education, Department Chair
E-mail: schelske@stolaf.edu
Phone: 507-646-3245
Dr. Mark Schelske grew up in mining towns in Northern Minnesota and Ontario. He graduated from Red Lake High School, a consolidated school in a remote gold mining area of the Canadian wilderness 300 miles north of the border. He received his Bachelor of Arts' degree in English from Carleton University in Canada's national capital, Ottawa Ontario. He moved back to the states to attend graduate school and has resided in the Twin Cities for the past twenty-three years. He earned an MA (T) in English from the University of St. Thomas, an MA in adult education from the University of Minnesota, and his Ph.D. in Education Psychology (Special Education), also from Minnesota. He holds teaching licenses in English and special education - Learning Disabilities and a K-12 administrator's license.
Mark's professional experience includes ten years in the Minneapolis schools as a special education teacher and an alternate school administrator. He has been teaching at St. Olaf since 1987. He teaches counseling, the Hawaii interim course, and multi-cultural education. Currently he is department chair and acting as a special assistant to the president for campus diversity. His areas of professional involvement focus on educational opportunity, alternative education and urban education. Mark's major efforts in the field of education involve program development and grant writing.
