Recent research suggests that many faculty members believe that their students are lacking the information literacy (IL) skills needed to be successful in their college career. Reports also suggest that there is a broader issue about the uncertain position of IL in the university curriculum. This article uses data from a worldwide survey of political science faculty to better understand how widespread this perception is, what is being done about this perceived problem, and what steps can be taken to encourage faculty to implement IL training in the classroom. We find that faculty believe that there is a problem but many are not explicitly teaching IL as part of their courses. We also find that faculty members who have received IL training are far more likely to include it in their courses. This leads us to suggest that IL training should be provided at the faculty level, which will have positive downstream effects on the IL training that students receive. We also contend that IL deserves a more prominent place in the university curriculum.

Computational methods have become an integral part of political science research. However, helping students to acquire these new skills is challenging because programming proficiency is necessary, and most political science students have little coding experience. This article presents pedagogical strategies to make transitioning from Excel, SPSS, or Stata to R or Python for data analytics less challenging and more exciting. First, it discusses two approaches for making computational methods accessible: showing the big picture and walking through the workflow. Second, a step-by-step guide for a typical course is provided using three examples: learning programming fundamentals, wrangling messy data, and communicating data analysis.

Political science courses often address difficult topics that can take an emotional and psychological toll on students, including burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious traumatization. There is a growing awareness of the importance of reflective and self-care practices in teaching, especially considering the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on student mental health. However, this is a rarely discussed topic in political science. This article discusses the results of our pedagogical research on the emotional impact of learning about atrocities, the challenges of studying during a global pandemic, and the benefits of self-care activities (e.g., meditation) for student well-being. Our research is based on two different courses and includes student self-reflections and our analysis of class discussions. We conclude that our students struggle with the emotional costs of studying difficult topics (especially during the pandemic) and are receptive to doing self-care activities and find them beneficial for their mental health.

This article presents an original simulation, called Tick, Tick, Boom, which is designed to help students examine the use of torture in counterterrorism interrogations. The simulation is designed to be embedded in a larger array of course content but needs only one 50-minute class period to play. Unlike many similar games, students participate individually, learning the consequences of their actions through dice rolls. The article summarizes the gameplay and debriefing, presents a brief assessment of the simulation as an activity, and offers suggestions for future extensions.