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5. Agricultural Colleges. These, of course, are a prime- 

 necessity. There should be, and probably will be, one in each 

 province. There are four main functions of such institutions; 



(a) To investigate 



(b) To train leaders and experts 



(c) To carry on extension service or adult education 



(d) To assist in organizing Chinese agriculture and country 



life. 



The question as to junior or senior grade for these institu- 

 tions is largely a matter of ability to develop. The ideal would 

 be the senior college. At present, however, the junior college 

 is perhaps about as far as China can go, for present institutions- 

 are practically a combination of the last two years of the middle 

 school and two years of junior college. South-Eastern Uni- 

 versity, is on a senior college basis, and probably each main 

 region of China will support senior agricultural colleges as soon 

 as sufficient funds are available for support. 



As teaching institutions, the main purpose of these colleges 

 is to train specialists. As soon as China can give employment 

 to them there should be specialists in each of the major farm 

 problems we have described. No headway can be made until 

 science applied by trained men can be brought to bear upon 

 every one of these problems. 



The agricultural college should emphasize the whole rural 

 problem, and give a large place to economic, social, and govern- 

 mental aspects of that problem, as well as sound training on the 

 technical and managerial sides. 



6. The Teaching Method. All agricultural schools of all 

 grades should keep in mind at least the following considerations 

 in teaching: 



(a) Use wherever possible the problem or project method^ 

 Correlate agricultural material with other subjects in the course. 

 Use concrete material without too much dependence upon text 

 books. Let pupils deal with real things with a chance to test 

 farm methods themselves. 



(b) Give sufficient practice in hand work so that the 

 student at least appreciates the manual skill involved in the 

 process. One of the complaints made by experienced Chinese 

 observers is that graduates of agricultural schools and colleges 

 are "too theoretical/' they do not know the farmers' problems 



