e way, but the system
has fitted itself to local notions and perhaps to local needs. A rough
division may be made--those states which have some form of central
control and those which do not have. Even among states having a central
management are found all degrees of centralization; Wisconsin and Ohio
may be taken as the extremes. In Wisconsin the director of institutes,
who is an employee of the university, has practically complete charge of
the institutes. He assigns the places where the meetings are to be held,
basing his decision upon the location of former institutes in the
various counties, upon the eagerness which the neighborhoods seem to
manifest toward securing the institute, etc. He arranges the programme
for each meeting, suiting the topics and speakers to local needs,
prepares advertising materials, and sets the dates of the meeting. A
local correspondent looks after a proper hall for meeting, distributes
the advertising posters, and bears a certain responsibility for the
success of the institute. Meetings are arranged in series, and a corps
of two or three lecturers is sent by the director upon a week's tour.
One of these lecturers is called a conductor. He usually presides over
the institute and keeps the discussions in proper channels. Practice
makes him an expert. The state lecturers do most of the talking. Local
speakers do not bear any large share in the programme. Questions are
freely asked, however.

Ohio has an institute society in each county, and this society largely
controls its own institutes. The secretary of the State Board of
Agriculture, who has charge of the system, assigns dates and speakers to
each institute. After that everything is in the hands of the local
society, which chooses the topics to be presented by the state speakers,
advertises the meeting, and the society president acts as presiding
officer. Local speakers usually occupy half the time.

It does not seem as if either of these plans in its entirety were
ideal--the one an extreme of centralized control, the other an extreme
of local management. Yet in practice both plans work well. No states in
the Union have better institutes nor better results from institute work
than Wisconsin and Ohio. Skill, intelligence, and tact count for more
than particular institutions.

New York may be said to follow the Wisconsin plan. Minnesota goes even a
step farther; instead of holding several series of institutes
simultaneously in differen