a study of school administration and supervision, kindergarten work, Negro education, education in home economics, home education, vocational education, home and school gardening, civic education, and health education. It is organized to give expert information on public and private school statistics of all grades and kinds, on library organization, and other educational agencies. It has an Editorial Division which supervises the publication of annual reports of educational progress in the United States and foreign countries, educational statistics of the United States, besides numerous bulletins and circular letters on many subjects. The bureau has also full charge of the education of the natives of Alaska through its Alaska Division, with 7 superintendents, 109 teachers, 12 physicians, and

FIG. 3.-Chart illustrating the organization of the United States Bureau of Education.

12 nurses and teachers of sanitation, besides clerks and other assistants.

The Rural School Division of the Bureau of Education is of especial interest to rural-school teachers and rural leaders. It was organized as a division in 1911, and reorganized in 1915 in order to make it better able to meet the increasing demands for expert advice and assistance in the rural field. As now organized the division comprises the subdivisions of rural-school administration, rural-school practice, and rural-school extension service. The subdivision of rural-school administration has been organized to offer expert advice in rural-school administration to State and local boards of education, to advise with commissions and committees on school legislation,

is organized to make a fundamental study of the curricula of rural elementary and secondary schools and to offer such aid to rural I

teachers and school officers as may be required of them; to become a clearing house for the latest and best of subject matter and helps in other phases of school practice, including the training of rural teachers, both before going into the service and while in the field. This subdivision has charge of the propagation of the National Rural Teachers' Reading Circle, which has recently been adopted by more than half of the States. The subdvision of rural-school extension is primarily active in such educational interests in rural communities as boys' and girls' industrial clubs, educational rallies, illiteracy campaigns, school fairs, rural-life conferences, wider use of schoolhouses for lecture centers, work for the extension of the school term, securing better teachers' salaries, improvement of school buildings and grounds, organization of parent-teacher associations,

FIG. 5.-Chart showing proposed plan of organization for Federal aid in voca

tional education.

cooperation with farm demonstration agents and local and State supervisors.

The specialists and assistants in the Division of Rural Education are aided very effectively by nearly 100 special collaborators, who are nominally in the service of the Government, but who, as members of the various school faculties or as State or local school officials, are in a position to report to the Bureau of Education every progressive movement taking place in the rural field. Several of these have undertaken valuable studies, of which a few have already been completed.

Publications of the Bureau of Education.-The Bureau of Education exhibit contained bound volumes of the Commissioner's An

nual Report-comprising as Volume I reports of the educational progress in the United States and throughout the world, as Volume II educational statistics of the United States-bound volumes of various circulars of general information, and bound volumes of bulletins of the bureau, of which about 50 are published annually. The latter contain the results of special educational investigations by bureau specialists and special' collaborators connected with State departments of education and higher institutions of learning. Many of these bulletins deal with rural and agricultural education and may be secured by teachers and general readers free of cost by addressing the Bureau of Education. They may also be procured for a nominal sum from the Superintendent of Documents, Government Printing Office, Washington, D. C.

EXHIBITS PLANNED AND ORGANIZED BY THE BUREAU OF EDUCATION.

Proposed plan of Federal aid for vocational education.-Vocational education received considerable attention in the general educational exhibits. One of the charts presented graphically the provisions of the Smith-Hughes bill, which formed the report of the Commission on Federal Aid for Vocational Education rendered in June, 1914, but which failed of passage at the last session of Congress. The bill was planned to provide Federal aid to public supported and controlled schools below college rank, to train teachers for agricultural education, trade and industrial education, and home economics, and to pay part of the salaries of supervisors and directors of agricultural subjects and teachers of trade and industrial education. The chart shows the plan of the proposed organization. This was to be headed by a Federal board for vocational education to consist of five members the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of the Interior, and the Postmaster General-with the Commissioner of Education as executive officer. The appropriation for salaries of teachers, supervisors, and directors of agricultural education was to be $500,000 the first year, increasing to a maximum of $3,000,000 annually; for training teachers of agricultural, trade, industrial, and home economics education, $500,000 the first year, increasing in four years to $1,000,000 annually; for salaries for teachers of trade and industrial education, from $500,000 the first year to $3,000,000 annually. The passage of a bill similar to this proposed plan would unquestionably mean for the future of vocational education in the United States what the Smith-Lever Act now means for the extension of agricultural and home economics education in rural communities.

Negro education.-Progress in Negro education was graphically told in an exhibit prepared by the Hampton Institute for Negroes, at Hampton, Va. This instructive exhibit comprised graphic charts and photographs of many school activities, emphasized particularly the importance of industrial education for the Negro, and showed graphically the influence of industrial education on his daily occupations. Schools for southern Negroes are giving increasing prominence to agricultural education in the schools and agricultural extension work among adults. The new school courses lay stress on practical phases of agriculture and home and school activities. through industrial clubs for young people and moving schools and other forms of extension activities for adults.

Among the charts exhibited two illustrated in a striking way the importance of the Negro as a factor in the Nation's agricultural life and emphasize, consequently, the need for further advancing agricultural and other industrial education for the colored race.

Chart 6 gives the percentage of farms operated by colored farmers in 15 Southern and border States. It shows that in 8 of the 15 States the percentage increase in farms operated by colored farmers is outgrowing the percentage increase in white farmers, which is remarkable in face of the fact that these States are getting a considerable influx of immigrants from Europe and farmers from Northern States. The companion chart gives the percentage of farm owners among colored farmers. It shows that the percentage of actual farm own