In 1934 there were 976,089 pupils enrolled in the public schools, or 77.2% of the population between the ages of 5 and 17; of these 739,636 were of kindergarten and elementary, and 236,453 of secondary grade. The number of public school teachers was 31,469. Private and parochial schools had an enrolment of 145,294. Public expenditures for elementary and secondary edu cation in 1934 were $68,359,622 or $75.02 per capita of pupils in daily average attendance. The illiteracy rate was 2% in 1930 as against 3.3% in 1910. In many public schools vocational courses were added in recent years. At the institutions of higher education, attendance greatly increased. Some of the colleges with church connection shared in this growth; but the chief en largement was at the University of Michigan and the Michigan State college of Agriculture and Applied Science.
The higher State institutions of learning consist of a university (see MICHIGAN, UNIVERSITY OF), four teachers' colleges and nor mal schools, an agricultural college and a school of mines. The university (at Ann Arbor) was established in 1837, and is under the control of a board of regents elected by the people for a term of eight years, two every two years ; the president of the institu tion and the superintendent of public instruction are members of the board but without the right to vote. The State teachers' colleges are : the Michigan State Normal college at Ypsilanti (1849) ; the Central Michigan Normal school at Mount Pleasant (1895) ; the Northern State Normal school at Marquette (1899) and the Western State Normal school at Kalamazoo (1904). All of these are under the State board of education. The Michigan State college of Agriculture and Applied Science at East Lansing, 3m. east of Lansing, is the oldest in the United States ; it was provided for by the State Constitution of 1850, organized in 1855 and was opened in 1857. The College of Mines, at Houghton, was established in 1885. In 1935 there were 2 2 other institutions of higher learning within the State, but not maintained by it, in cluding Detroit university, Wayne university and Detroit Tech.
reporting were operated by tenants as compared with 15.1% in 1925 and 17.7% in 192o. Gross farm income in 1935 was $217,100, 000, of which $136,000,000 was from live stock and live stock prod ucts. The table above shows acreage and value of principal crops in 1935. Michigan ranked third among the states in 1934 as a pro ducer of beet sugar. The growth of mint on the muck lands in the south-western counties is quite as old as the State. Market garden ing is an important industry both in the south-west and south-east counties. All the principal fruits are grown in large quantities in what is known as the fruit belt in the south-west ; grapes are grown chiefly in the south-western counties. The area nominally in woodland, including farm wood-lots as well as forests and cut over lands, comprises nearly two-thirds of the State; but the area bearing good timber has so much diminished that produc tion for 1934 was only 236,000,00o board feet. The barrenness of the sandy soil and the shortness of the growing season have hin dered the reduction of land to cultivation, and some o.000,000ac. (more than a quarter of the State) are thus a deforested desert.