In the Classroom
Washington College encourages hands on learning and the Political Science department offers unique project based course for non-traditional learning opportunities.
In the Classroom Learning
The Politics of Food in Africa
In 2018, Professor Carrie Rieling led a course on African Politics. Their major assignment of the semester was creating a website with a variety of blog posts discussing food politics in Africa.
US Political Campaigns and Elections
It’s one thing to read about the intrigue, strategy and drama that goes into running a presidential campaign. It’s another thing to actually participate in such a campaign.
In Dr. Flavio Hickel’s course, US Political Campaigns and Elections, students ran their own presidential campaign as part of a simulation.
Two students ran as presidential candidates for the Democratic and Republicans, respectively, while their classmates developed a campaign strategy, complete with a social media campaign and presidential ads. Students also examine polling data and real-time information to decide where and how to allocate their campaign funds and where to spend their advertising dollars.
Check out the final product of the campaigns from Spring 2021, here, with Lauren Davis’s campaign as the Democratic nominee and Emily Fehsenfeld’s campaign as the Republican nominee, complete with positive and negative campaign ads!
Women and Politics in the US
Students in Dr. Melissa Deckman's Women and Politics course last spring researched the gender dimensions of public policy and became policy advocates!
Rather than writing a research report, students learned how to make infographics that try and convince readers of the importance of their policy issues. Infographics are increasingly used by think tanks, non-profits, and advocacy groups to display information in graphic and accessible forms.
Check out some of the best infographics from our class below!
