The day classes of the college are open to men and women students over the age of sixteen. Students who do not live at their own homes are required to reside in the college hostels or in lodgings licensed by the college. Women students in residence for not less than one session (three terms) are required to reside in the college hostels, unless they have received the principal’s permission to reside elsewhere.
COURSES IN HORTICULTURE
The Department of Agriculture and Horticulture was founded in 1893. Its work is carried on under the inspection of the Board of Agriculture. Courses in Horticulture consist of lectures and laboratory work in the college and of practical work in the college garden and fruit station.
The college garden, four acres in extent, adjoins the main college buildings in London Road, Reading. It consists of vegetable and flower gardens and orchard, and is provided with horticultural buildings. The houses, greenhouses, vineries (early and late), peach house, etc., are used for plant and fern growing, general florist work, market work, and the culture of grapes, pot fruit trees, etc. Students spend upwards of twenty hours per week in the garden, and, in addition, pay frequent visits to neighbouring private gardens, as well as to Messrs. Sutton and Sons’ Trial Grounds, the exhibitions of the Royal Horticultural Society, and the Royal Gardens, Kew.
Besides instruction and practice in the routine operations of the garden, students are placed in charge of sections of both indoor and outdoor work. In their second year they may specialise in market and florists’ work, or in fruit growing, in preparation for work at home or in the Colonies. In all cases they pay special attention to the business side of horticulture and assist in the work of marketing and book-keeping.
During their two sessions’ course, students may take advantage of the workshop, and of the instruction in carpentry, etc., provided, to learn how to make up boxes, staging, and how to repair, glaze, and paint.
In addition to preparing for the college diploma or certificate, students may also prepare for the examinations of the Royal Horticultural Society or of the Board of Education, South Kensington.
During the session 1905–6, eleven acres of the college farm at Shinfield, two and a half miles from Reading, were planted as a fruit station. On this station students will be able to study modern methods of fruit and vegetable cultivation on a commercial scale.
Courses of instruction have been arranged as follows:—
The diploma in horticulture is awarded at the end of a two years’ course in the science and practice of horticulture. The course is designed for students who intend to take up horticulture as a career. It provides training in the sciences on which the practice of horticulture is based, in market and florist work, and in fruit-growing.