HOME ECONOMICS AND EDUCATION 693 



it will be necessary for the State directors to send out organizers to 

 call meetings for women and organize them into clubs as auxiliaries 

 to the farmers' institutes of the county and State. If this were done 

 their number would increase many hundredfold within a year. Aa 

 soon as the State directors come to see and appreciate the importance 

 of this phase of their work such organizers will be employed and 

 women's institutes established equal in number at least with those 

 now in operation for men. (Ex. S. Circ. 85; A. R. Ex. S. 1910.) 



"University Extension" Work. The term university exten- 

 sion has been used in recent years to denominate in a general way 

 the efforts of our colleges to promote the diffusion of knowledge out- 

 side of their own halls. Though not always spoken of under this 

 head, no university extension movement in this country has actually 

 been so widespread as that on behalf of agriculture. Broadly speak- 

 ing, this would properly include the dissemination of agricultural 

 information through the publications of the experiment stations and 

 this Department. The stations annually issue over 400 publica- 

 tions, which are distributed to mailing lists aggregating half a mil- 

 lion addresses, and this Department supplements these with some 

 600 others, of which about 7,000,000 copies are distributed. But 

 confining ourselves to what would more usually be considered uni- 

 versity extension work, we find the colleges of agriculture largely 

 engaged in conducting farmers' institutes and home-reading courses 

 and helping to introduce nature study into the common schools. 

 The result of pushing this educational motive into the rural com- 

 munities has been a most decided waking up of those communities, 

 which, even if the work were to stop at the present time, will con- 

 tinue to exert an influence for a generation and more. (Y. B. 1899 

 and 1897.) 



The development of agricultural extension by the land-grant 

 colleges has been one of the most remarkable features of their work 

 during the year. The report of the standing committee on exten- 

 sion work of the Association of Agricultural Colleges and Experi- 

 ment Stations shows that extension departments have been organ- 

 ized in 32 States and Territories by 35 institutions, and that in 3 

 other States departments have been partially organized. One hun- 

 dred and thirteen persons were employed for their full time in ex- 

 tension work in connection with the colleges and stations and 189 

 persons contributed part of their time. Appropriations from all 

 sources for carrying on the work during the year amounted to some- 

 thing over four hundred thousand dollars. (A. R. Ex. S. 1910.) 



Education extension in agriculture has suddenly come into 

 such prominence as to demand much attention from those who 

 have the needs of agriculture to provide for. This new movement 

 requires that the interests of agricultural people shall be considered 

 with reference to providing facilities for instruction in agriculture, 

 not merely for the comparatively few students resident in colleges, 

 but also for the great body of rural people who are unable to attend 

 distant agricultural institutions or even to enter upon a normal or 

 high school course. (A. R. Ex. S. 1909.) 



