AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4510, 3 September 1875, Page 3

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

As the question of agricultural education is just now exciting attention in South Australia, the following extract upon the subject from the New Orleans Times will be read with interest:— “ It is much to bo regretted,” says the paper referred to, “that the system of education generally adopted at agricultural schools in this country results in the rearing of young men for the learned professions rather than for that of the husbandman. They are never trained into the physical development which takes from labor its terrors, but are simply taught theories, without an effort being made toward instructing them into the art of practically demonstrating them. Of course young men so educated will never think of embarking in agricultural enterprises as a matter of choice, except on a large scale, and as the paid subordinates of a capitalist. They will expatiate by the hour upon theories, but will be as innocent of an acquaintance with a plough or hoe-handle as was ever a student of law or medicine. The country has little or no need for such men. What it wants is practical people—men whose thews and sinews have been hardened by toil, and who have been taught by a regular ti-ain-ing to have no fears of the hardships, exposures, and self-denials of a farmer’s life. The calling must not have been lowered in their estimation by their course of education, but elevated ; aud prizes won by successes in its pursuit must be made to overtop all others in their desires. This ought to bo the aim of an agricultural school, and it would doubtless be if that school was conducted in the proper manner. An agricultural school should in reality be a model farm, with the additional advantages to the student of having professors of certain sciences, a knowledge of which is moat important to the farmer. Everything to be done on a farm should be done there ; and everything which a farmer should do to form a part in the course of instruction. Certain hours should be set apart for study and others for labor, and nothing calculated to elevate the tone and dignity of tho calling should be neglected. Such an establishment ought not to receive students younger than sixteen, yet should be open to any young man of good character under thirty years of age. The prices of board and tuition should be fixed at just sufficient to pay the expenses of the institution, with a moderate interest upon the capital invested, all students being placed upon exactly the same footing, and a rigid obedience to the rules expected from them. As the farm should be cultivated by the united labor of the scholars, there would of course, be products of all kinds made. These should be sold to the best advantage, and the proceeds placed to the credit of the students, according to their labor. And if there should happen to be an excess over and above their expenses for board aud tuition, they should be paid interest upon this excess ; the whole should be handed them, with their diploma, when they graduated, so that they could have the proud satisfaction of knowing that not only had they achieved forthemselves an education, but a sum in cash to begin life with. The same principle might be applied to schools for girls. There could be taught the necessary sciences as well as all the duties of the housewife ; to spin and weave, cut out and make-up clothing, butter and cheese malting, bee-culture, poultryraising, and, in a word, all that a woman should know to be in reality a helpmeet for a farmer. By a wise system an emulation and a love for the calling could be stimulated, until, from being the least considered, to be a farmer would become the object of the ambition of our youth, and to be a farmer’s wife the highest prize matrimonial in the minds of our daughters. Such a course of training would elevate the young people in their own estimation, and enable them to take the lead in every neighbourhood into which they went. They could work with the workers, talk with the talkers, and think with the thinkers, always evincing a cultivated mind, and showing well-skilled hands. There would then be no sneers from the ignorant at their college airs ; and their parents would never have cause to repent having spent money in the education of children who came home to be ashamed of their unsophisticated habits and rough manners. And they would make our country bloom before their generation passed away.