This paper reflects on teaching sport in political geography undergraduate courses in the United States, through which I simultaneously aim to de-essentialize geopolitics and de-essentialize sport. I integrate sport examples in diverse courses on political geography and teach a dedicated "Geopolitics of Sport" course. By framing my…

Since the establishment of the "Journal of Political Science Education" (JPSE) in 2004, the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning has become more rigorous and data-based, thanks in large part to the efforts of editors, peer-reviewers, and submitters to the journal. Where does the field go from here? I argue that our greatest strengths lie…

This article presents a memorable method to introduce new students to the concept of political needs. Using an adaptation of Abraham Maslow's "Hierarchy of Needs" to one of "Hierarchy of Political Needs" the instructor presents how needs for "physiological survival," safety, belonging, "recognition," and…

This reflection focuses on my experiences teaching political science through a black worldview suggested by Dr. Mack H. Jones. In 1971, Dr. Mack H. Jones challenged black political scientists to subvert the efforts of white political scientists by creating an alternative frame of reference that focused on African American and African communities…

Data visualization is an important tool for communicating research results. This manuscript discusses a method that instructors can use to introduce political science students to visualizations and discusses strategies that instructors can share with students about how to create high-quality visualizations. These strategies can help students make…

Election forecasting has become the centerpiece of media coverage of elections. Yet for all the attention paid to forecasting, public understanding remains low and increasingly distrustful. We can improve citizen knowledge and comprehension and increase student engagement by giving students the opportunity to develop their own election forecast.…

Political Science is a relatively new subject in the Mauritian academic context. As a small island developing state located in the Indian Ocean, it has many interesting features from which to draw to teach the discipline. These features include the ethnic and cultural diversity of its population; the island's political stability in a geographical…

The rise of populism has sparked a debate about the role of facts in public discourse. How should higher education teachers respond? This article reviews the literature on approaches to teaching and identifies and problematises a tension between emphases on facts and thinking. It then outlines the current 'post-truth' challenge, which suggests…

In this article I discuss an approach to teaching about the Russian war in Ukraine that uses the war as a focal point for teaching about topics in comparative politics and international relations. I discuss the pedagogical advantages for political science teaching, including meeting the interests of students, introducing students to theories in…

Despite the relevance of qualitative methods in political science, the process of teaching qualitative research has received relatively little attention in the literature. What is it like to teach qualitative research in political science? This article focuses on the teaching of qualitative research by exploring examples from Brazil. The country…

Although the benefits of undergraduate research for students are broadly understood, implementation of undergraduate research in the college classroom can be challenging. In this article, I explain how blogging assignments can be used to enable students to successfully complete course-long research projects and achieve many of the content and…

There has been a massive shift in teaching quantitative political research since the "Journal of Political Science Education" was launched in 2004. Smartphones were an anomaly, and it was uncommon to have laptops in the classroom. Statistical calculations were sometimes done by "statisticians", i.e., professional staff who did…

"Active learning" strategies--peer instruction, simulations, hands-on activities, and the like--improve student performance and engagement. However, instructors often struggle to incorporate these techniques into their courses. Doing so can be especially difficult in large lecture courses, where the number of students makes activities…

Today's political environment continues to become more polarized as Americans find themselves taking sides on controversial issues. While this is certainly not new to the American democratic experience, the way we as a country are combating it is. With the nation engulfed in a political maelstrom, people are forgetting how to have a civilized…

In recent years, scholar-educators have examined a variety of new approaches for teaching research in political science. Many of these inquiries begin with the observation that research activities cause some students to experience trepidation and aversion. The result is often poor performance in courses which assign research. In this project, I…