INFLUENCE OF YALE FORESTRY SCHOOL A NATIONAL FACTOR

The position of importance which the Yale School of Forestry has reached has been well outlined by Professor J. W. Toumey, Professor of Forestry in Yale University. He shows that this school was organized to assist through research and technical training in establishing the permanency of forest industries. Although founded as late as 1900, the school is the oldest technical forest school in the country, and since its foundation 21 other institutions of collegiate rank have established departments of forestry and offer technical training leading to a professional degree. Of these schools of forestry 11 are now headed by graduates of the Yale department.

In the short space of 15 years, 344 men have graduated with the degree of Master of Forestry, and 120 additional men have enrolled who did not complete sufficient work for a degree. At present 153 of these graduates are in the United States Forest Service, holding commanding positions. They have occupied a prominent place in shaping the forestry policy of this country and in putting that policy into execution. Out of twenty States that have organized departments of forestry under technically trained men, 12 are directed by men who received their training at Yale, while nine additional men hold less important positions in State forestry.

The most striking development of the Yale school during the past year has been the perfection of arrangements by which tropical forestry will become an established part of the work. Final plans as to organization and personnel have not yet been announced, for the school is wisely proceeding slowly in the development of the work. An amendment to the agricultural appropriations bill now pending before Congress has been offered by Senator Reed Smoot, of Utah, adding $25,000 to the Forest Service appropriation for investigations in Central and South America, and if this amendment should be adopted it is entirely possible that the Yale School and the Forest Service would arrange for a certain amount of co-operation in carrying out the research.

Another important step has been the re-establishment of the short summer course at Milford, Conn., for this will be of decided value in making the Yale school better known. The short course is intended for young men who are thinking of forestry as a profession, but who are doubtful as to its requirements and their fitness for the work; for those interested in the care of woodlots; and for teachers of nature study, botany, and agriculture.

During the junior year a student spends 10 weeks of the summer in camp at Milford and one week in the spring on a tract of 6,000 acres of hardwood. Two weeks are also spent in the virgin forests of the Adirondacks and considerable time in the woods of New England. The seniors spend 12 weeks of camping in the woods of the Southern states.

A bulletin describing in detail the management of the School's forest at Keene, N. H., is about to be issued.