Relevance, Quality, and Expedience: Political Science Responds to COVID-19: Rethinking the Political Science Major during times of Crisis

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Session Description

In this round table, panelists will discuss the current efforts by an APSA working group on rethinking the political science major. During the course of the past year, since the convening of an APSA sponsored conference on "Rethinking the Political Science Major" in May 2019 and the continuing work of the group at the APSA Teaching and Learning Conference in February 2020, we have been working on a report that was to suggest guidelines on learning objectives and curricular structure regarding the undergraduate political science major. However, recent crises, most notably the COVID-19 Pandemic and the widespread anti-racist protests following the death of George Floyd, has fundamentally altered the current situation facing political science, and raise important questions about how we teach about politics to undergraduate students. The COVID crisis has fundamentally changed how we teach and the anti-racist protests have called into question what we teach. As to the former the discipline must grapple with how the pandemic has impacted our goals as well as well as how we are best able to promote student learning and the development of skills when we are all at a distance. As to the latter, we must revisit some of the content of what we teach, especially the general lack of materials about race and ethnic politics in our introductory level political science courses (which reaches the greatest number of American students). Panelists will discuss how we might adjust our thinking about the goals and structure of the political science major in the face of these challenges.

Sub Unit

• Theme Panel

Cosponsor

• Division 10: Political Science Education

Chair

• John Ishiyama University of North Texas

Presenters

• Fletcher McClellan Elizabethtown College

• Michelle D. Deardorff University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

• Matthew B. Platt Morehouse College

• Elizabeth C. Matto Rutgers University, New Brunswick

• Terry Gilmour Midland College

• John Ishiyama University of North Texas