International Studies Director Dr. Hamerly addressed APSA Teaching Symposium

Dr. Ivy Hamerly, who has long taught an introductory course on comparative politics at Baylor University, shared her insights and experience during the Teaching and Learning Symposium in Washington, DC held on June 27 – 29, 2024. 

Organized by American Political Science Association, the symposium gathered instructors of comparative politics courses from across the US to share their own practices and research related to teaching and create new teaching resources for their courses. 

 Dr. Hamerly’s talk “Theoretical Puzzles: Introducing Comparative Politics Using Three Theoretical Lenses” discussed her experience with teaching Baylor students how to apply rationalism, structuralism, and culturalism in their analysis of political phenomena. 

In her classes, Dr. Hamerly explains the three theoretical traditions based on an analogy to camera lenses. She first demonstrates a short, simple application assignment that asks students to explain why the chicken crossed the road using each of the theoretical traditions. She then offers a longer, more complex application assignment that asks students to use the three theoretical approaches to explain why brawls sometimes occur in legislatures. 

 A sample lesson based on Dr. Hamerly’s presentation in Washington, DC will be available at APSA Educate: https://educate.apsanet.org/resource-collections