4 86 



Russian Agricultural Schools. 



Agricultural Schools in Russia* 

 Agricultural education in Russia, which until recently does 

 not seem to have been in a very active condition, has during 

 the past decade received considerable attention from the 

 Ministry of Agriculture, and since <M. Yermolow's accession 

 to that post a fresh impetus has been given to the institutions 

 affording instruction of this nature. The two superior schools 

 of agriculture have been completely reorganised by him, their 

 scope and teaching staff being enlarged, and additional pe- 

 cuniary means being placed at their disposal. Other agri- 

 cultural schools, also, while not being subjected to the same 

 important changes, are nevertheless being developed, and 

 their number is largely increasing. 



General agricultural schools in Russia may be divided into 

 three categories : higher, intermediate, and lower. The 

 higher instruction is provided — apart from such institutions as 

 the " Polytechnic " at Riga, which has an agricultural side, and 

 from lectures on vine cultivation at Yalta, etc. — in two " High 

 Schools," one at Moscow, and the other, the New Alexander 

 Institute, in the Government of Lublin, not very far from 

 Warsaw. The first of these, prior to its reorganisation in 

 1894, was known as the Petrowsky Institute ; and the latter, 

 remodelled in 1893, as the Alexander Academy. The in- 

 struction at both these schools lasts four years, and both are 

 well equipped with experimental fields, etc. The Moscow 

 High School takes 200 students, and has 1,600 acres of 

 land attached to it, of which some 630 acres are forest and 

 530 farming land. The New Alexander Institute takes 250 

 pupils, and has a total of 4,000 acres, nearly half of this being 

 forest and 1,600 acres farming land. Provision is made, as 

 far as possible, for practical work of varied character, but it 

 would seem that this is as yet not very thorough, and the in- 

 struction is at present looked upon as too purely scientific. 

 Degree^ — carrying the title of agronome — are granted after 

 examination at the end of the course, but only when the 

 pupils have satisfactorily performed a half-year's practical 

 work upon a farm. 



* From the Mitteilungen der Deutschen Landwirtschafts Gesellschaft, No. iS, 

 1899, Supplement. 



