AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION 233 



effort is being made to give students a working 

 knowledge of the operations of the farm. Al- 

 though agricultural students are now, in many 

 cases, required to know the handicraft of farming 

 when they enter college, they seldom have enough 

 practical knowledge to enable them to assimilate 

 the scientific training which they receive in College. 



Eight years in the Primary and Grammar 

 schools and four years in the High School are now 

 required to fit pupils for the University and for 

 the best agricultural colleges. Even if the boy is 

 a farmer's son and has a disposition to learn 

 manual things, there is not enough time left out- 

 side of school hours nor is the preparatory student 

 mature enough to see their bearing upon the 

 sciences which he is to study in college. Nature 

 study may very properly be taught in the schools 

 but not the farm handicrafts. 



The agricultural colleges must take one of two 

 courses: they must either require students to take 

 practical examinations in farming before entering 

 college or they must provide the means whereby 

 they can acquire in college enough practical knowl- 

 edge to save them from being the laughing stock 

 of the unlettered farmer. The first seems to me 

 undesirable even if the schools and the farmers 



