Abstract
A project was undertaken in five randomly selected schools of Shahkot Tehsil. By taking 10 students from each class, 5 teachers from each school and all the five headmasters, Le. 150 student respondents and 30 teachers/headmasters were interviewed with two separate interview schedules. The analysis of data revealed that according to the majority of the student respondents, their fathers never visited the schools. Moreover, a majority of the students and teachers never visited exhibitions, stalls and model farms.
INTRODUCTION
Presently, agricultural field has been increased in number but Khan (1981) revealed that majority of the farmer respondents were dissatisfied with the working of Agricultural Extension field staff. Most probably, the reasons for dissatisfaction on the part of the farmers may be vast and scattered rural area; inadequate number of field • workers, inefficiency of field workers, unsuitable system of extension education and limited financial resources. Due to these and other reasons, the latest recommendations have neither been diffused nor adopted successfully by the farmers and consequently it has not yet been possible for them to get the potential yield of any crop.
In order to solve the above stated problem and to produce enlightened future farmers, it is direly needed to utilize the supplementary sources like schools for the purpose of enhancing agricultural productivity. The Commission on National Education (1959) also acknowledged the role of agricultural education in improving agricultural production. Malassis (1975)
suggested that to meet the requirements of agriculture and for overall development, agricultural education in most countries, therefore, requires energetic expansion and better adjustment to the country's needs. Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (Anonymous, 1983) recommended that agricultural education should be aimed at selling up close cooperation between the school and the community with a view to study the agricultural practices and improve and upgrade the ,agricultural productivity through transfer of improved knowledge and technology and helping the students to learn by doing on farmers' fields. According to Mahmud (1979), Agricultural education at school level had proved itself to be an important factor in the improvement of farm practices. Prima (1977) viewed that the ultimate aim of Agricultural Education should be to produce better farmers. According to the present arrangement), the schools are mainly meant for probing instruction about agriculture with little practical emphasis. Hence, the present study was designed to determine the present and future role of the rural secondary schools in the diffusion of agricultural practices among the farming community.
