TECHNICAL TRAINING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20307, 15 July 1929, Page 5

TECHNICAL TRAINING.

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. ADVANCE IN ENGLAND. GOVERNMENT ASSISTANCE Ihe J'i itiilj Ministry of .Agriculture's technical education schemes give to the younger generation of British farmers an advantage, which was denied to their fathers; and it is but fair lo say that 11ie.se schemes are being increasingly appreciated by those fur whose benefit they have been devised. J lie efforts of the Ministry to improve the farmers' position in this way come under three headings—Education, Advisory Work, and Research. On these and related activities no less than £700.000 yearly are spent. There has been a big expansion of programme since 1921, when the Government c)f the day repealed the Corn Production Act, by which it had been agreed to pay bounties for graingrowing. As a sop to the resentful farming community the sum of £1,000,000 was then set aside for agricultural education and research. This is a large amount, but the good work, which is being done for the money seems to provide full value. Excluding Scotland, which has a separate administration in this line, there are now sixteen University Departments of Agricultural (Cambridge, Leeds, Heading, Wales), and Agricultural Colleges (Wye College in Kent, the Harper-Adams in Shropshire, the Seal-Hayne in Devon, and the Midland College in Nottinghamshire), which receive financial aid from the State for providing higher education. Grants to these institutions total about £50.000 yearly. In most cases they are " block " grants, guaranteed for a period of years, thus enabling the colleges to lay their plans well ahead. Courses of Instruction. The college courses of instruction extend over from two to four years, leadto diplomas or degrees. For tuition alone—apart from board and lodging—the fees charged are usually £SO to £SO yearly. In recent years, the average total of students in residence at all the agricultural departments and colleges has been upwards of .2000. Many of the students take up practical farming at Home or overseas, but the degree men more often proceed to a research or lecturing post at Home or in one of the j colonies. Nearly all the colleges serve also as " advisory centres " for the region surrounding, counties being grouped in agricultural provinces for this purpose, with a college as the centre of each j province. The advisory officials are | usually distinct from the teaching staffs |of the colleges. They are men, who are specialists in their several spheres, and they are appointed and paid by the Ministry. These services, which cost | nearly £60.000 yearly, include, chemistry (soils, manures, and feeding-stuffs), plant I pathology (insects and fungi), economics (farm accounts and co-operation), | veterinary medicine, and dairy bacterio- | logv. The last-named officers have as | their main business the encouragement of clean milk production. At present there are between 70 and SO advisory officials at the various centres in England and Wales, and it is stated that in a recent two-year period personal advice, or advice by letter, was given in nearly 50,000 cases, while 90,000 samples of milk, fertilisers, and feeding-s'ulTs were analysed. County Council Schemes. The Ministry of Agriculture does not monopolise the business of providing educational facilities for farmers. Most county councils have developed schemes of agricultural education, varying in scope, but framed with an eye to local ■ types of farming. Funds for this county work conic partly from local rates, but in most cases money grants are also obtained from the Ministry covering from two-thirds to three-fourths of the total cost. The report of a recent year shows that some 350 lecturers are employed on county work, that the classes held during the twelve month's were attended byover 7000 students, and that- the expenditure on these activities reached £300,000. Evening classes for farmers and field experiments on selected typical farms are leading features in the work of the county organisers and their staffs. The level of achievement in farm dairying and in poultry-keeping lias undoubtedly been much raised in the last twenty years through tho influence of the travelling butter and cheese making schools, the clean milk competitions and egg-laying trials that have been organised by many county councils. Instruction is given, too, by peripatetic lecturers in furriery, beekeeping, veterinary science, farm bookkeeping and manual processes .What are known as Farm Institutes, in which the courses provided are shorter, have become increasingly prominent in the country's agricultural education scheme since the war. The farm institutes form part of the local or county councils' educational activities, though the Ministry makes a 75 per cent, grant toward the cost of erection, and contributes toward their support on a similar scale. Residential Institutes. Residential institutes have now been established in 17 English and Welsh counties; and some 750 youths and girls are receiving every year the short practical training in agriculture, dairying, poultrykeeping, horticulture, and domestic science, wliich it is their purpose to give. The courses cover one, two, or even extend to three.'terms, each of eleven weeks. Fees are quite small, being usually no more than £1 weekly, for board, lodging and tuition. Attached to every institute there is an experimental farm, primarily for the purpose of demonstrating new and improved methods, etc., and for the benefit of fanners in the county. For those who wish to take advantage of the training provided, but cannot afford if, a good number of scholarships arc offered, both by the Ministry and the county councils. About 130 scholarships are offered yearly by the Ministry, specially for the sons and daughters of agricultural workers. Most of these are tenable at farm institutes, where they defray completely the cost of board, lodging and tuition. A few, however, of greater value and longer duration, are provided to enable students, who have already done well at farm institutes to take more advanced courses at agricultural col : leges, """ ' "