Cumulative Contributions of 

 Southern University Programs to 

 the South's Professional Work 

 Force in Forestry and Forest 

 Products — In the first 36 years 

 since the Biltmore Forest School 

 started (1898-1934), Biltmore, 

 Georgia, Louisiana State, and 

 North Carolina State produced a 

 combined total of 470 forestry 

 graduates. An estimated 300 

 entered the field upon graduation. 

 There is no estimate as to how 

 many of these went to work in the 

 South. 



The number graduating in the past 

 50 years from southern institutions 

 and the proportion of these 

 entering their chosen fields in the 

 South are far less clearly 

 documented. Based on interviews, 

 the judgment of program leaders 

 and faculty, and school records, 

 my very rough estimates are as 

 follows: 



• Total number of first 

 professional degrees granted in 

 forestry and forest-products fields 

 by southern universities and 

 colleges since 1934—18,700. 



• Total number of graduates 

 who entered a related position in 

 the South— 11,140 (59.6 percent). 



For the forest-products fields, I 

 had hoped to develop indications 

 as to the proportion of the South's 

 professional work force from 

 southern university programs by 

 sampling the southern membership 

 rolls of the Society of Wood 

 Science and Technology and the 



Forest Products Research Society. 

 But the available data bases did 

 not include such information 

 (Thomas, personal 

 communication). 



For professional foresters, I 

 sampled the southern membership 

 rolls of the Society of American 

 Foresters in 3 separate target years 

 (1929, 1962, and 1985) to determine 

 what proportion of the membership 

 had received the first professional 

 degree from a southern institution. 

 The first 2 target years were 

 chosen because the Society 

 published membership directories 

 in those years, and they came 

 close to coinciding with the end of 

 the bonanza era (1929) and the 

 midpoint of the Second and Third 

 Forest Eras (1962). 



Table 3 suggests that the 

 proportion of professional foresters 

 in the South with the initial 

 professional degree from a 

 southern school grew from 3.2 

 percent in 1929 to 61 percent in 

 1962 to 68 percent by 1985. Thus, 

 by the 1960's southern schools had 

 trained the majority of the 

 professionals who were managing 

 the world's largest example of 

 intensive, high-production forestry 

 (Lee, personal communication). 



Further indicators of the 

 proportion of the current southern 

 professional work force educated 

 in the South are samples taken of 

 the 1984 southern membership of 

 the Association of Consulting 



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