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Land-Grant System

Agricultural Transformation, Technology and Extension

The land-grant system is the framework, established in the United States by the Morrill Act of 1862 and extended by later legislation, under which the federal government granted public land to states to fund colleges teaching agriculture and the mechanic arts, creating a national network of public universities with an explicit agricultural teaching, research and extension mission. It gave the United States one of the world's most extensive public agricultural research and extension infrastructures and served as a model referenced, though not directly replicated, in other countries' own public agricultural university systems.

Facts
Origin Year
1862 1
Michigan's 1855 Agricultural College anticipated the federal model; the land-grant system itself dates from the Morrill Act's passage.
Classification
Concept Class
Agricultural Transformation, Technology and Extension 1
Connections

Associated With

Cornell's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences is the agricultural college of one of the original US land-grant universities.

Texas A&M AgriLife, Institutions

Texas A&M AgriLife is the extension and research arm of Texas A&M, one of the original US land-grant universities.

Sources
1. Morrill Land-Grant Acts (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia Foundation
  • The Morrill Act of 1862 section
    The reconfigured Morrill Act was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln on July 2, 1862.
  • lead description (concept-class)
    The land-grant system is the framework, established in the United States by the Morrill Act of 1862 and extended by later legislation, under which the federal government granted public land to states to fund colleges teaching agriculture and the mechanic arts, creating a national network of public universities with an explicit agricultural teaching, research and extension mission.
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