The Morrill Act of 1862 provided the funding mechanism for the modern land-grant college system. In the over 160 years since its passage, the tripartite land-grant mission of teaching, research, and service has become the most recognizable legacy of the legislation. Recent scholars of land-grant education caution against viewing the history of…

The land-grant system's tripartite mission of teaching, research, and Extension was intended to improve the American livelihood while making contributions to the advancement of U.S. agriculture and economic development. To date, historical analyses within the field of agricultural education have focused on special interest topics rather than a…

In 2023, the 118th Congress will reauthorize the federal Farm Bill, the primary legislation through which Congress supports the nation's system of land-grant colleges and universities for teaching, research, and cooperative extension, which supports local agriculture and the agricultural sciences. This report examines the contributions of and…

Historians of higher education generally agree on a handful of ideas about the early years of the land-grant colleges that grew out of the Morrill Act of 1862. For their first three decades, the land-grant colleges struggled to survive: lacking students, funding, and public favor. Charged, by the Morrill Act, to promote "the liberal and…

The debate over the federal government's role in education has taken center stage in recent months, with many arguing that it is time to "hand education back to the states." While state control may sound appealing to some, this perspective overlooks the crucial role the federal government has played in establishing and protecting a…

Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs) are colleges and universities across the United States and U.S. Territories enrolling significant percentages of racially minoritized undergraduate students or created with the explicit purpose of serving specific populations of racially minoritized students under various programs created by U.S. Congress (U.S.…

Administrators are viewed as the leaders in higher education. However, accepting exceptional educators as relational leaders is vital as changes in higher education demand institutions provide value and quality to their stakeholders. Exceptional educators at our land-grant Midwestern university are nominated and awarded the title of Morrill…

How can digital art--based research counter Indigenous eradication and settler replacement enacted by land-grant universities (LGUs)? How can non-Indigenous settlers ethically engage in decolonizing work? With these questions, our art-based research project emerged from a spring 2021 Pennsylvania State University (PSU) graduate seminar, Land…

Popular and academic common senses turn to education as the great equalizer in American life, a seemingly obvious pathway to creating a more just world. Education, which means not only a degree, but the social relations created through affiliation with formal study, is cherished as the pathway to secure a more just society. Yet the educational…

The Stepping Out and Stepping Up (SOSU) Native American Racial Justice Project initiative, developed in partnership with First Nations Development Institute (FNDI), was designed to address the dispossession and sale of tribal lands used to establish the Ohio State University. This work was inspired by the publication of the "Land Grab…

In order to understand our present and future work in planting the seeds of solidarity, we excavate the past, through an exploration of transnational solidarity and the vestiges of U.S. legislative policy and philanthropy. Through life notes and sharing circles, we examine policies (Morrill Act of 1862, Refugee Act of 1980, and the Gates…

Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) are vital to higher education. Yet, many land-grant HBCUs have received lower levels of funding since their inception. While many state legislatures have targeted funding toward HBCUs in recent years, many institutions feel that the historic inequity must be remedied. This issue brief examines…

Inspired by participation in the 2014 version of the Stewardship of Public Lands seminar, hosted by the Yellowstone Association Institute and sponsored by the American Association of State Colleges and Universities' American Democracy Project, the author's first goal was the creation of a "Sophomore Seminar" course themed on "Parks,…

In this article, I read Hilgard Hall as a text of whiteness to explore how one campus building at the University of California, Berkeley renders racial power relations in the academy. Through the lens of critical whiteness studies, I examine Hilgard Hall's namesake, architecture features, and weighty epigraph, "to rescue for human society the…

This article provides a historical review of the FCS profession beginning with the Progressive Era and founder Ellen Swallows Richards. The review includes a summary of significant historical events and legislation, that reveal how the FCS profession addressed the needs of individuals, families, and communities from inception to the present. From…