40 



been, under the stress of modern conditions, to throw upon the 

 schools almost the entire responsibility for the industrial arid 

 agricultural education of minors. It is becoming increasingly 

 apparent that the school cannot meet this difficult and expen- 

 sive burden, unaided. It would therefore seem to be equitable 

 that the schools should bestow the related theoretical instruction 

 which they are so well designed to give, leaving to factory and 

 farm the task of giving, under expert direction, the practical 

 experience which they are well equipped to confer. 



Economical. Such part-time work would reduce the cost 

 of agricultural training of secondary grade so as to place effec- 

 tive training for the farm within the reach of many communi- 

 ties which would otherwise be unable to secure it. Part-time 

 work would obviate the necessity of sending the boy away from 

 home in order to secure the benefits of agricultural training. 

 The cost of living for the boy would be less at home than at a 

 boarding school. Parents would be deprived of the services of 

 the boy during only a portion of the day. 



Effective. Co-operative work between the school and the 

 home farm would be the most effective known means of trying 

 out, under the conditions of individual farms over widely scat- 

 tered areas, methods which have proved to be profitable else- 

 where, as, for example, at the State Agricultural Experiment 

 Station. Such co-operation would furnish the only experi- 

 mental means by which each boy could try out the merits of 

 the home farm as an agency for producing profits, when treated 

 by the best-known methods ; that is to say, part-time work would 

 furnish the only means whereby the principles and methods 

 taught by the school could be positively adapted by the boy to 

 the economic conditions on the farm on which he might spend 

 his working days. Part-time work thus should give to agri- 

 cultural teaching the reality of actual life, as but little school 

 training can give it. 



Conclusion. It is believed, in short, that every purpose of 

 economy in the establishment and maintenance of a system of 

 agricultural schools, and of efficiency in the education provided, 

 would be insured by utilization to the largest possible extent 

 of home land, equipment and time in the training of boys for 

 the successful pursuit of farming in this Commonwealth. 



