Hoping to recommend strategies for fundamentally revamping agricultural college programs throughout the United States in order to keep pace with the changing needs of society, a former UC Davis chancellor has launched a one-year study. Funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the research project will be conducted by James H. Meyer. Last year in the journal Science, the chancellor emeritus published results from a nationwide survey of agricultural college leaders suggesting that land-grant colleges and universities need to evolve beyond their traditional emphasis on production agriculture if they are to survive and serve an increasingly urbanized nation. According to Meyer, since their establishment more than 130 years ago, the land-grant colleges have helped U.S. farmers improve production so much that the number of people needed in the agricultural sector has plummeted, leaving the status and future of these colleges uneasy. "Although the original land-grant model was appropriate for its time, the modern environment at scientific and agricultural universities calls for a new model," he says. To better serve society, the land-grant colleges of the future will need to place more emphasis on the environmental and consumer-oriented aspects of that system, he says.