Antigone, Sophocles' 5th century take on the Oedipus story, dramatizes war, fratricide, attempted patricide, suicide, the loss of young love, civil disobedience, and capital punishment. These elements make for great theatre but Antigone is also an immensely useful tool to engage undergraduate students from many disciplines in learning about politics. I use Antigone as a “motivating text” in political theory courses to engage students in the study of politics and persuade them of the importance of this field of study (Turner 2005).

Asian Americans are among the fastest-growing minority groups in the United States. In recent years, their impact on politics has been the focus of a growing number of scholars in the social sciences, which raises the definitional question: Who are Asian Americans? The working definition deployed here is that an Asian American is a person who “resides in the United States on a permanent or long-term basis, regardless of citizenship or other legal status” (Lien, Conway, and Wong 2004). However, the definition of who an Asian is has undergone significant expansion over the last 150 years because of “shifts in the racial and ethnic makeup of the U.S. population and changes in social attitudes and political concerns regarding racial and ethnic minorities” (Lien, Conway, and Wong 2004). These concerns expressed themselves in various modes of political participation; referred to in the literature as the “Asian American movement” (Wei 1993), these have ranged from litigation to the boycott activities of Asian Americans on a variety of issues.I would like to extend my gratitude to Jane Junn of Rutgers University as well as to members of the APSA Committee on the Status of Asian Pacific Americans in the Profession for encouragement and valuable feedback on this article.

When is garbage not garbage? A conference on cleaning, clearing, and reclaiming a dump site may seem an unlikely place for political scientists and scholars of international relations to pursue professional development, but the pursuit of knowledge knows no bounds—even if the smell can be hard on the nose itself! Observing such supposedly non-political sessions can quickly reveal that they are anything but, and discussions of how garbage is handled elsewhere can offer useful comparative insights as the local becomes global. Furthermore, few occasions provide such a useful context for developing one's critical thinking skills and recognizing the value of interdisciplinarity—an approach often touted as desirable in our profession.My thanks to John Chilton, Jeremy Bendik-Keymer, the members of the Dubai Natural History Group, and an anonymous reviewer for this journal for their feedback on earlier versions of this essay. I am also indebted to Hassan Tayim, Robert Cook, and the participants in the conference which prompted this article for their organizational efforts and inspiration.

What is the probability of students cheating?

I found myself asking this question quite literally recently, when 10 of my students in an upper-level undergraduate methods course turned in identical results for a take-home exercise. Of course, on some exercises I expect students to produce identical findings, such as when I ask for the mean and variance of a particular variable. In this case, however, I had asked students to produce a new random variable and to summarize its values in a frequency distribution. My initial reaction was to suspect the students of collaborating on the exercise (contrary to my syllabus and the assignment's instructions), though the number of students who produced identical results—10 out of a class of 30—made me skeptical that so many students could conspire so effectively. The very nature of the students made it unlikely that they collaborated together. I teach at a large public-service university, with students that represent a broad variety of backgrounds, nationalities, interests, and ages. The course also is cross-listed among disciplines, so the 10 students included both political science and geography majors. My review of the names of the 10 students persuaded me that it was highly unlikely that they cheated. I have found, furthermore, that many students will not voluntarily work in groups. So how did this diverse group of students produce an identical “random” variable?

My investigation of this question took me well beyond issues of student conduct. To answer the question to my satisfaction, I found I had to understand how campus computer networks operate and ultimately how the statistical software my students use works. My journey took me into the arcane world of “random” numbers in computers, and required me to understand how statistical software generates so-called pseudo-random numbers. When I finally found an answer to my puzzle, I learned that the problem was not with my students, but with the software on which we all rely for research and, increasingly, pedagogy. Many researchers today know there is no such thing as a computer-generated truly random number. Although many political scientists know this has profound consequences for their work—whether for sampling purposes or Monte Carlo experiments—to my knowledge instructors of quantitative methods courses have given little thought to its implications in the classroom. For one, it is easy and tempting to mistake the problems of pseudo-random number generation for student malfeasance. For another, it speaks to the students' (and instructor's) conceptual grasp of the slippery idea of “randomness.” For this reason, I offer my own experience as a cautionary tale.

I'm shaking hands with Bill Clinton, and about to turn him over to the coaches and players of the Rhodes College baseball team for handshakes of their own. The team has just spent two hours touring the museum part of the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock after defeating Hendrix College 6-0 in an afternoon game in nearby Conway. Bruce Lindsey, Clinton's right hand for the past 20-plus years and a Rhodes alum, graciously arranged the meet-and-greet at my ardent request.

As several recent articles in PS have noted, study abroad remains one of the most important and vital ways to make the international relations and comparative politics classroom more active, participatory, and experiential (Thies 2005; Bowman and Jennings 2005). Along with various pedagogical techniques (such as simulations, film, and Internet and web-based technologies) increasingly used by political science instructors to enhance the learning environment, the study abroad experience helps bring the world into the classroom because it can connect directly and experientially with students. Studies have shown that studying abroad increases students' cross-cultural abilities and global understanding, skills particularly relevant to comparative politics and international relations courses (Kitsantas 2004; Hopkins 1999). Indeed, because of study abroad's value as one component in active, student-centered learning, as early as 1991 the APSA Task Force on Political Science, in the so-called Wahlke Report, made the recommendation that political science departments should strive to increase the number of their students who participate in study abroad programs of some kind, a recommendation echoed again recently by several higher education panels (Wahlke 1991; Bollag 2003).

During the Cold War, whistle-blowers and dissenters were threatened and penalized; they lost jobs, faced social and governmental harassment, and often lived thankless and persecuted lives. It was never entirely clear where the speech boundaries lay, or when one might get sanctioned. Today, the “War on Terror” is becoming a hegemonic framework, the Patriot Act has been made permanent, and there are ongoing revelations about increased surveillance in the United States. Along with these developments, there are increasing efforts to punish academics for expressing contentious views. At a minimum, teaching topics that disrupt the comfort zone can be emotionally draining and may produce some negative reactions in the classroom. Under such pressures, self-censorship can be a natural consequence. Yet open democratic deliberation, well-rounded education, and intellectual freedom are prerequisites for best serving our world.

Writing assignments are common in most political science courses. If nothing else, they serve the purpose of allowing instructors to exercise their evaluative power in assigning grades. All too often, however, they fail to transcend this purpose. As a result, both students and instructors often view each student paper as a private communication between the two parties—a work with no future and an audience of one (Zeiser 1999; Fulwiler 1982).

A college-level introductory course rarely gets the attention it deserves. It tends to be the oldest course in one's repertoire; the course that has the least-direct interface with one's research activities; the one that is most easily farmed out to adjunct faculty; and also the one that draws the largest audience, from all corners and crevices of the campus. It is easy to fall into a comfort zone with an introductory course, instead of thinking self-critically about one's method and effectiveness of instruction. Moreover, in a department setting, the introductory course is rarely the focus of our interaction with colleagues.

This is the 34th year that I have been monitoring participation by women at our Annual Meeting. These PS reports have documented the ascent of women in our profession. Considerable changes in the status of women in the profession have occurred since 1972 when I first did my tally of participation at our Annual Meeting. (Ex., the three most recent APSA presidents have all been women; a long way up from marginalization.)

APSA is pleased to recognize political science faculty members who received campus-wide and department awards for teaching excellence during the 2005–2006 academic year. APSA, Rowman Littlefield Publishers, and Pi Sigma Alpha, the national political science honor society, recognize award-winning faculty members each year at the Reception Honoring Teaching at the APSA Annual Meeting. Recognized faculty members receive a certificate noting their accomplishment and their awards are announced here and on the APSA web site.

The 3rd Annual APSA Conference on Teaching and Learning in Political Science hosted over 300 participants in lively discussions of trends, techniques, and models in teaching in political science. Held in downtown Washington, D.C. on February 18–20, the Conference was organized as a workshop-based forum to develop models of teaching and learning as well as to discuss broad themes affecting political science education today. Joining the discussion, APSA President Ira Katznelson (Columbia University) and keynote speaker Thomas E. Cronin (Colorado College) shared their thoughts on teaching and learning in the discipline. For a full list of participants and more information on the 2006 Conference, visit www.apsanet.org/section_236.cfm. For information on the 2007 Conference, contact [email protected].

If teaching is not the oldest profession, it certainly has a long historical pedigree. The frustrations teaching evokes likely have an equally long pedigree. One sees in Plato's Republic, for example, Socrates' frustration in trying to convey to Glaukon the aims of the educational scheme he is presenting to his interlocutors in Book 8. His evident difficulties relaying this information have doubtless struck sympathetic chords in the breasts of countless generations of teachers. Frustration has certainly been the case for the present authors, particularly in teaching the analysis and understanding of secondary commentary on classic texts; when reading such articles, students express puzzlement about the long debate over seemingly trivial points. Many come away from such classes convinced it is not worth investing time in understanding classic texts because the discussion of them centers on apparently arcane and obscure grammatical, historical, or technical questions. This essay presents an approach with which the authors have had some measure of success in helping students “see the point” of this especially difficult dimension of analyzing and understanding texts and authors. Our approach teaches students to identify and appreciate the “agenda argument” often put forward by such commentators. An “agenda argument” is a contemporary scholar's effort to address a current problem or issue through critical reflection on an iconic text or author in the field. The term “agenda” is appropriate because it clarifies that the scholar has an interest in an underlying general claim through discussion of the technical points being debated. In other words, the scholar has a larger agenda in mind that guides the selection of issues and determines the use of points in the text.

The Teaching Research Methods Track at the third annual APSA Teaching and Learning Conference included 26 participants from schools ranging from small colleges to major research universities. The program included presentations on the state of the undergraduate research methods field, information literacy, and a variety of teaching innovations, culminating in a large group discussion where we agreed upon a common set of strengths, opportunities, and challenges to teaching research methods, as well as a set of recommendations for a future Conference track.

People in political science.

Many instructors face challenges in engaging students in lecture courses. In the fall of 2004, we incorporated innovative, real-time polling technology into an upper-division political science course on Public Opinion. The polling technology channeled students' technological savvy in the service of several pedagogical goals. The technology increased student engagement and reinforced the substance of the course material. It also provided students with topically relevant experiences in answering survey questions and allowed students to feel more comfortable in expressing their opinions during discussions.We thank Victoria Cross, James Fowler, Ethan Scheiner, Walter Stone, and Elizabeth Zechmeister for helpful suggestions. Funding for the technology was generously provided by the Undergraduate Instructional Improvement Program, supported by the vice provost–undergraduate studies at the University of California, Davis.

I show herein how to write a publishable paper by beginning with the replication of a published article. This strategy seems to work well for class projects in producing papers that ultimately get published, helping to professionalize students into the discipline, and teaching the scientific norms of the free exchange of academic information. I begin by briefly revisiting the prominent debate on replication our discipline had a decade ago and some of the progress made in data sharing since.My deepest appreciation goes, in addition to my students, to the numerous scholars who have cheerfully, and in some cases repeatedly, responded to my students' queries over many years. Thanks also to the National Institutes of Aging (P01 AG17625-01) and the National Science Foundation (SES-0318275, IIS-9874747) for research support.

The roots of the political science discipline are intertwined with developing the skills required for democratic citizenship. Teaching and research efforts in this admirable tradition are still a prominent focal point of our academic tradition, as evidenced by the work of the APSA Task Force on Civic Education, reoccurring arguments about the most effective pedagogy for promoting participation, and works assessing the effects of civic education interventions. Moreover, this tradition has become increasingly relevant as political participation in the United States, especially among young people, continues to decline. Panel studies of college freshmen indicate that young people's participation in an array of political indicators—including thinking that keeping up with politics is important, discussing politics with friends, and acquiring political knowledge—have all declined by about half since the 1960s (Sax et al. 2003). Far more young people voted in 2004 than in the past, as turnout by 18–24 year-olds increased from 36% in 2000 to 42%, but younger citizens' appearance at the polls still lagged behind prior cohorts of young Americans, as well as their current elders (CIRCLE 2005). Educators and policy makers have come to the conclusion that intervention through formal civic education is necessary (Carnegie Corporation of New York and CIRCLE 2003; Galston 2003). Spurred on by works such as Educating Citizens (Colby, Ehrlich, Beaumont, and Stephens 2003) and Civic Responsibility in Higher Education (Ehrlich 2000), many colleges and universities have reinvigorated their mission of grooming students for civic leadership. Most of the skills identified as essential to such efforts could be labeled as deliberative communication skills. As the Colby et al. (2003) note:

This issue of PS: Political Science and Politics introduces a new segment: Booklist. In this section we endeavor to list the upcoming book publications across the broad fi eld of political science. This current list is necessarilly limited: only publishers who submitted the information to PS are included. In an effort to make the process more egalitarian, to recognize the work of scholars independent of the quality of the media relations department at their publisher, we ask for our readers' assistance; in the future this section will be fully reader generated. If your fi rst-edition book is scheduled for publication in the three months before publication of the next issue of PS (i.e., if it will be published in the April, May, or June months that lay between publication of PS's April and July issues), enter the details of publication in the box found at PS's web site: www.apsanet.org/section_223.cfm. We hope that spreading word of upcoming work will help keep our members even more attune to new scholarship within the discipline.

Understanding the importance of using technological tools in teaching political science, the organizers of the APSA Teaching and Learning Conference dedicated two tracks to teaching with technology. Track I was moderated by Robert H. Trudeau of Providence College.