Let us go back for a moment to the organization of the Department of Agriculture. The school at Sleepy Eye have available what every other school should have—five acres of tillable ground. This tract at Sleepy Eye is devoted to tests and experimental work, to flower gardens and to individual school gardens—one for each child who applies.

The experimental work and tests are carried on exactly as they would be at a state experiment station. In the section of Minnesota surrounding Sleepy Eye, corn is the great staple crop. Therefore on the demonstration grounds of the Department of Agriculture, Independent School District No. 24, Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, they are growing a number of plots of corn, each plot variously planted, fertilized, cultivated, and cared for, so that the children may learn at first-hand scientific methods of discovering the best kinds of crop, and the best ways of handling a crop in their own locality.

The allotment of the school gardens carried with it instruction in engineering and in civics at the same time that the bonds between home and school were cemented. The part of the school land that was to be devoted to school gardens was turned over to the older boys, who surveyed it in exactly the same way that the United States government surveyed the homestead tracts. The plot was laid out in towns and ranges. The sections were staked and numbered. Then the children who wished to take up plots went into the newly surveyed territory, picked their plots, and filed an application with the land commissioner for a plot, stating the section, town and range. After that a line formed and the plots (20×20 feet) were allotted. No child was permitted to take up an allotment unless he had the endorsement of a parent or guardian. The form on which this endorsement was secured was as follows:

Name________________________ Grade__________________
_______ Sec____ Town______________ Range____________

APPLICATION FOR LAND IN PUBLIC SCHOOL GARDEN, DEPT. OF AGR., SLEEPY EYE HIGH SCHOOL

“It is assumed that the parent or guardian who endorses this application will co-operate with the school authorities and have the applicant care for and weed said land during the growing season, and devote at least two and a half hours each week this summer to the agricultural work as may be directed or required by the Director of the Department of Agriculture, Mr. Haw.

“I hereby apply for.......... Sec.......... Town........... Range.......... in the Public School Garden of Sleepy Eye High School, and will cultivate and care for same as may be directed by the proper authorities, and will keep a careful record of the returns therefrom and report same on or before Oct. 20, 1911. I will do the additional agricultural work that may be directed as indicated above.

..................................... Applicant.
Endorsed by ............................ Parent or Guardian.”

The form carried on its opposite side statements showing the character of crop and its value, the amount paid for seeds and an itemized statement of the returns. The school gardens proved an admirable success. The children had learned the details of a great historical event in their own state—the giving out of free land; the boys had conducted a miniature survey; rivalry had been developed in the competition over plots; the gardens, laid out side by side, served as a splendid object lesson in quality of work; no boy or girl could allege a teacher’s unfairness from an untilled, weedy plot; the parents were made to feel that the school was doing something practical for their children; the children were taught a simple form of accounting and cost-keeping; and, best of all, they were made to feel their citizenship in the school.

The Department of Agriculture has, in addition to its experimental farm, a well-equipped laboratory, in which tests and experiments are carried on. Sleepy Eye is located in a dairy section; therefore one of the chief functions of this laboratory has been the testing of milk. Any farmer may bring milk samples and have the Babcock test applied to determine the percentage of butter fat which an individual cow is yielding.