90 AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS 



attendance 2,098,268. In addition to the regular institutes 

 included in the above a number of special institutes were held 

 with an attendance of 340,414, which, added to the attendance 

 at the regular institutes, make a total of 2,438,682. There is 

 no record of attendance of 732 meetings of women's institutes, 

 of 174 meetings of boys' institutes, or of several other meetings 

 which might be regarded as farmers' institutes (135). 



The function of the farmers' institute is to educate the people on their 

 own ground. It is a phase of extension work that carries education 

 directly to the localities in which the people live. It deals less with indi- 

 vidual men on their farms than with small communities or groups of men ; 

 it therefore has the opportunity to exert great influence in developing the 

 social life of rural neighborhoods (122, p. 462). 



With these aims on the one hand, and with an attendance 

 of over two million on the other, farmers' institutes become a 

 factor in rural education second only to the public schools. 

 Although the institutes are intended for adults it must be 

 remembered that adults are patrons of the rural schools, and 

 wherever the farmers' institute arouses the adult population 

 to a realization of a need for better schools, improvement in 

 these schools is likely to follow. 



In 1896 the American Association of Farmers' Institute 

 Workers was organized and has held annual meetings ever since. 

 This association is a sort of clearing-house for exchange of 

 ideas and methods, and is intended also to secure a more or 

 less uniform type of institute in the several states. In 1898 

 the association requested the secretary of the Department of 

 Agriculture at Washington to arrange for a division in con- 

 nection with the department to be known as the Division of 

 Farmers' Institutes. This request was subsequently granted by 

 establishing the office of Farmers' Institute Specialist. 2 



The general policy of farmers' institutes is influenced greatly 

 by the association and by the office of Farmers' Institute Spe- 

 cialist. At the meeting for 1908, the 



' The work of this office was referred to in chap. i. 



