628 



Danish School for Allotment-holders. 



[Jan., 



The Board have received through . the Foreign Office an 

 account of a Danish Agricultural School, which has been 

 founded for the purpose of training and instructing allotment- 

 holders and labourers of both sexes. The 



Danish School school, which is situated near Ringsted, is 

 for 



Allotment-holders. ca ^ e< ^ the Kaerehave Agricultural School, 

 and was opened on November 3rd, 1903. 

 The need for the education which the school offers is indicated 

 by the great number of persons who have taken advantage of 

 the course of instruction. During the short time it has been 

 open it has been attended by 375 pupils for long courses and by 

 800 other persons for shorter periods. The pupils are chiefly 

 the girls and farm hands, from twenty to twenty-five years of age, 

 who attend for a period of five to six months, although some 

 remain for a full year. The persons attending the short courses 

 consist of generally cottagers and allotment-holders from twenty- 

 five to fifty years of age. They visit the school for eleven days at 

 a time, but may attend several times if they desire to do so. 

 Only a limited number of the allotment-holders in Denmark are, 

 it is stated, able to live on the produce of their plots, without 

 having to seek other employment, and the object of the 

 Kaerehave School is to give these persons such a practical and 

 theoretical training that they may be able to turn their hold- 

 ings to better account. 



The school, which is the first and only one of its kind in 

 Denmark, is the outcome of a Committee appointed about four 

 years ago by the Minister of Agriculture for Denmark, which 

 reported in favour of the establishment of schools for the 

 instruction of small holders by short courses of lectures, &c. y 

 dealing particularly with farming in a small way and . the 

 minor rural industries. The Ministry granted this school a 

 loan of £3,330 on easy terms of repayment, and funds have 

 also been obtained from private sources. The town of Ringsted 

 gave 53.4 acres of land for the purposes of cultivation, so that 

 the property of the school is now estimated at about £8,330. 

 Part of the land is cultivated as model plots of various sizes, 

 while experimental gardens with fruit trees, bushes and 

 vegetables, have been established. Poultry, bees, rabbits, are 

 kept, as well as cattle and pigs. 



