TABLE 58.-Nature and extent of apprentice teaching in home economics education in four institutions1

1 With reference to the general results of this type of work 3 institutions reported excellent and 1, Connecticut Agricultural College, reported satisfactory.

In Connecticut good opportunities, at least from the standpoint of geographical location, are offered for apprentice teaching in home-economics education. One difficulty reported in this State is a common one in the apprentice system of student teaching. Welltrained and experienced high-school teachers comparable in ability with the institutional staff are not always readily to be found in the high schools utilized for apprentice teaching. While such teachers may meet the standards of the local high schools their qualifications by no means satisfy institutional officers who wish high-grade work of strictly collegiate character.

The difficulty is encountered in some States of providing effective oversight and supervision of the local high-school teachers who function as critics. In New Hampshire, the home-economics apprentice does her work in approved schools during the winter term and a professor in charge supervises the work directly and continuously.

A problem which arises in apprentice teaching is the provision of some means for harmonizing the demands of regular class-room instruction and the necessity for doing work at the same time away from the institution. In the New Jersey State College for Women, and elsewhere, a system of alternation of institutional work and student teaching has been worked out. This seems to be the most practical plan, since it leads to more concentration on student teaching at the time the course is taken.

Practice work offered especially for students training for SmithLever extension service.-While most of the land-grant institutions offer the same general type of instruction for prospective workers in Smith-Lever extension activities that is offered for their other

students in home economics, it is interesting to know that eight institutions have made beginnings in providing special practice work for such students. This training often is incidental only. Occasional demonstration work is required, and field service is offered in club work and in adult extension activities. In the University of Tennessee, assistance is given this program by the extension service. In Connecticut Agricultural College, six weeks' work in observation and participation in 4-H work and in adult extension work is offered. West Virginia University is planning to offer summer field work in home economics extension. Opinions differ as to the advisability of extensive programs in this field; but courses in professional education and teacher training that do not add materially to the effectiveness of Smith-Lever extension workers are in need of drastic revision and upbuilding. Extension work is teaching; it is a form of adult education, and many of the desirable skills and traits of an extension worker are much the same as those of any teacher.

Conclusions

The land-grant institutions may safely continue their present general program of development of the field of home economics teacher training, and should greatly expand their moderate program of refinement of instructional and related procedures in this field. The proportion of high-school girls who are taking courses in home economics is constantly increasing; while it is estimated that nearly 40 per cent of the high schools of this country do not yet offer home economics. Typical schools now offering this work are constantly expanding their curricula. Hundreds and perhaps thousands of public schools in many States will soon require additional new teachers of home economics as additional funds become available. The land-grant institutions constitute one of the very best among all agencies that train teachers of home economics. The potential field of service of home economics education to the States and to the Nation constitutes a challenge that may be confidently expected to insure constant upbuilding of home economics teacher-training in land-grant institutions.

Chapter XIV.-Vocational Agricultural Education

The annual requirement of new farmers in the United States is about 200,000. The task of providing for the systematic and relatively prolonged training of more than 99 per cent of the persons entering farming and of continuing the agricultural education of 6,000,000 adult farmers is one that will have to be carried out in the main through the local public schools if it is ever fully accomplished. The greatest opportunity that a land-grant institution has for influencing the agricultural practice of its State is in training an adequate personnel for the teaching of the agricultural courses which the public schools are obligated to provide.

Most of the land-grant institutions introduced offerings in agricultural education during the decade previous to the enactment of the Federal vocational education act of 1917. But two institutions had systematic courses of this sort before 1907. At present all but two (Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Porto Rico) have organized instruction in agricultural education. Due to the influence of the Federal vocational education act, which set aside funds for training teachers of agriculture and subsidized State and local programs of agricultural education of less than college grade, the work of departments of agricultural education in the land-grant institutions has come to be almost entirely that of preparing teachers for the system of vocational education in agriculture which has been set up in their States under the auspices of the Federal Government. Other functions have either ceased or have never been assumed because of an absorbing interest in the Federal program and because the State funds available for agricultural education have been used in offsetting Federal funds.

With this in mind it is necessary to make a detailed study of the program of agricultural teacher training which has grown up in connection with the federally aided program.

Federally Sponsored Program of Agricultural Teacher Training

Land-grant institutions in each of the 48 States and in the Territories of Alaska and Hawaii receive the Federal funds for teacher training under the provisions of the Federal vocational education act. 'Report of the United States Commissioner of Education for 1910, Vol. I, p. 256.

One hundred and sixty-five agricultural teacher trainers were employed in these institutions in 1928-29. In that year there were 2,775 students in training for the teaching of agriculture in federally aided departments.

In 1928, 34.2 per cent of the graduates in agriculture in these institutions qualified for teaching in federally aided schools. In nine States more than 70 per cent of the agricultural graduates were trained for teaching. Seventy-one and one-half per cent of all the agricultural graduates trained for teaching in the United States in 1928 were placed the following year in positions where they taught federally aided classes in agriculture, so that 448 of the 1,834 graduates of that year, or 24.4 per cent, were actually employed as vocational teachers in 1928-29.

Financial participation.-The financial share of the land-grant institutions in the federally sponsored program for training teachers of agriculture is very limited. It should be borne in mind that the Federal aid available may be applied only on the salaries of teacher trainers. Buildings and equipment must be supplied by the training institution. Every dollar available from the Federal funds for teacher training must be matched by a dollar from some State source. The State funds used for this purpose are supplied by the land-grant institution, or by the State board for vocational education, or by both jointly.

Only one institution, the University of Vermont, bears as much as one-half of the total costs. Only four bear even one-third of the costs. Twenty-five pay less than 10 per cent. Eighteen contribute nothing. Nine institutions contribute 50 per cent or more of the money which is used to offset Federal funds. Nine more contribute one-fourth to one-half of the State costs Thirteen bear some of the costs but less than one-fourth of the State costs. Eighteen, as already noted, make no financial contribution whatever to this program.

The foregoing statements account only for the regular teachertraining funds used in this program. In addition, according to Dr. C. H. Lane, chief in agricultural education of the Federal Board for Vocational Education, there was diverted into the teacher-training program in 1928-29 a total of $159,962.34 from the fund for salaries of agricultural teachers and supervisors. Moreover, $1,183.68 of the money designated as coming from the teachertraining institutions was actually supplied to those institutions from other sources. Having made these allowances, the share of the land-grant institutions in the costs of the federally sponsored program in 1928-29 is found to have been 9.39 per cent.

Forty-one institutions reporting in connection with the survey indicate that in 1927-28 they paid in salaries to instructors in agricultural education a total of $282,739. These same institutions received from the Federal Government in that year $307,993 for use in agri

cultural teacher training. It should be understood that Federal funds may be used to provide general courses in professional education for persons preparing to become teachers of vocational agriculture, but it is significant that the funds received from the Federal Government were greater than the total salaries paid all specialists in agricultural education. The land-grant institutions expended for the salaries of teacher trainers in agricultural education in connection with the federally sponsored program a total of $92,923.98, or slightly more than one-tenth of 1 per cent of the total expenditure for salaries and wages.

Growth of the public-school agricultural program.-Extensive demand for the graduates of agricultural colleges as teachers has been occasioned by the expansion of the public-school program in agricultural education initiated by the Federal vocational education act. The growth of this program is indicated in the following table. TABLE 59.-Students enrolled in federally aided courses in agriculture of less than college grade in the United States, 1918-19291

1 Data from records of Federal Board for Vocational Education.

Possibilities for further expansion of the federally aided program.-There is no accurate means of determining the percentage of the persons who are entering farming for the first time who have availed themselves of the opportunities for training in agriculture which their local schools afford. It is probable, however, that somewhere between 10 and 20 per cent of our new farmers have had training in federally aided classes extended over periods of one to four

years.

About eight-tenths of 1 per cent of the adult farmers in the United States were reached in 1928-29 by evening classes conducted as a part of the federally sponsored program.

According to the United States Office of Education there were in the United States in 1926 approximately 20,000 secondary schools.