EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



Vol. X. Xo. 1. 



Among the many important agencies for agricultural education in 

 this country must be counted the form of university extension work in 

 which home-reading courses are conducted on the Chautauqua plan. 

 The encouragement of agricultural education by this means has been 

 undertaken by several of the agricultural colleges, and with such 

 success as to demonstrate its practicability and value. The interest 

 aroused in systematic reading along definite lines has had a beneficial 

 effect upon the reader, apart from the information gathered, in cultiva- 

 ting the habit of thoughtful reading and in teaching him how to help 

 himself. Xot infrequently it has had the effect of arousing in the pupil 

 a desire for college education or at least of helping him to appreciate 

 the benefits of college training. This is a matter of unusual importance 

 in the case of agriculture, as one of the difficulties met with in attract- 

 ing students to courses in agricultural colleges has been the disparaging 

 of "book farming" by farmers and the failure of the farmer's boy to 

 realize the value to himself of an agricultural course — that there is 

 anything in farming beyond what his father can teach him. 



The interest which has been aroused in reading courses where sys- 

 tematic effort has been given io their inauguration has been quite 

 remarkable. The success of the enterprise in the State of Xew York, 

 where this and other forms of university extension among farmers have 

 been most extensively undertaken, has been especially striking and its 

 results are likely to be very far-reaching. That there is an increasing 

 demand for education by this means is also shown by the year's 

 experience of Cosmopolitan University, which is devoted entirely to 

 instruction through the medium of correspondence. Although in 

 operation less than one year, this institution now has upon its rolls 

 nearly 20,000 students, distributed throughout the United States, Cen- 

 tral America, and Canada, who are pursuing courses of reading in a 

 wide range of subjects, under the direction of a faculty located at the 

 university. This faculty numbers fourteen, besides assistants, and their 

 instruction is given entirely through correspondence with the individ- 

 ual pupils. Indeed the instruction is more individual than iu ordinary 

 school work, for the individual circumstances and capabilities of the 

 pupils have to be learned and taken into account in assigning and 

 directing the work, 



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