bushels of corn to the acre planted. The
school has persuaded the farmers that well-bred cattle are more
profitable than mongrel cattle. Consequently the farmers are raising the
standard of their herds. When the farmers come into Sleepy Eye they go
to the school. Perhaps they have milk to be tested; perhaps they are
looking for suggestions regarding soil or blight; perhaps they want to
know the latest facts about the scale or rust; perhaps they want some
advice about farm implements. In any case they go to the school.

The farmers have been led to the school through the children. The boys
have gone home to their fathers with suggestions and improvements of
inestimable value in the management of the farm. The girls have gone
home to their mothers with practical ideas on the running of the
household. These demonstrations of school efficiency have done more than
argument or persuasion ever could hope to do in convincing the fathers
and mothers of the usefulness of the school.

VIII Theoretical and Practical

The work in mechanics seems to interfere in no essential particular with
the regular academic work of the school. The boys and girls are
interested and enthusiastic. That counts for a great deal. Then, too,
boys and girls come to school for the mechanical work who would not come
at all if the mechanical work were not there. The academic work which
such boys take is clear gain. Through the mechanical work many pupils
become interested in the school, and the school means, for all pupils,
academic as well as applied work.

"We do not discount those parts of an education that were once the sum
total of the work in every high school," Mr. Cederstrom says. "They are
all offered and taken by the students. We are trying to give in addition
to these academic branches the kind of education which will appeal to
the children as being of a common-sense order." There is in the high
school a Latin Course, a Scientific Course, beside the Agricultural
Course and the Industrial Course. All of the students are required to
take this academic work. Many, in addition, take the industrial and
agricultural work, even when they do not receive credit in their
academic course. Each high school student is allowed two periods a day
in laboratory work, shop-work, or some other form of applied education.
In addition to those periods, the students may work in the shops or
laboratory after school, if they please. Many of them get their applied