RURAL AND AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION 49 



substitute for the present wasteful and chaotic trial and error 

 method, scientific advice and suggestion based upon such evi- 

 dence of the child's native capacity as 



Vocational d i r c c- might be obtained through carefully kept 

 tion must be both school records, objective ratings by suc- 

 scicntific and hu- cessive teachers, scientifically devised 

 man. tests, desires of parent and child, etc. Vo- 



cational direction, in a word, must be both 



scientific and human. To be scientific it must be objective, to 

 be human it must focus on the child rather than on the industry. 

 In being both scientific and human, we have faith also that it 

 will be really and fundamentally social. 



This matter of vocational direction is a field in itself a 

 field of tremendous importance as well as of interest. Its further 

 study is urged especially in agricultural and rural education. 

 The need is great in this field because many people (even born 

 and living to maturity in the country) will never make good 

 farmers and should have been directed or advised toward vil- 

 lage or city industries or professions where both their compe- 

 tence and happiness might have bren fully assured. Secondly, 

 the need is great because the social and economic organization in 

 the country lacks variety and opportunities for contact or ex- 

 perience. 29 The city boy has a wonderful chance for trial and 

 error, wasteful as that method may be. The country boy on the 

 contrary is significantly limited when it comes to trying out or 

 even observing other than one or two kinds of farming and a few 

 closely allied types of work. And, finally, the need is great agri- 

 culturally, because some means should be found to select out 

 and provide possible trial opportunities for hundreds, perhaps 

 thousands, of city youths who may have every requisite for suc- 

 cess in farming, including mental and physical abilities, adequate 

 capital, and the proper personal desire or interest. 



But vocational direction, important as it may become, is 

 only one part of the great problem. Given the boy with the 

 proper desires and characteristics, how shall he be trained to 



29. Rural Education (The Objectives and Needs of Rural 

 Elementary Education). W. C. Brim. Macmillan Company. 



