Internationalization is a hot topic on college and university campuses today. It is also one of the hot button topics facing the APSA (see Varshney 2004; Breuning 2005). Although relatively recent to APSA, internationalizing the higher education curriculum has long been a concern of educational scholars. Arum (1987) identifies three areas in which campuses can pursue internationalization: promoting the international content of curricula, tracking the international movement of scholars and students, and providing technical assistance and educational cooperation programs that engage American education in efforts abroad. Rivers (1994) adds a fourth dimension: promoting awareness of other cultures and ways of thinking through extracurricular cross-cultural experiences, which would ideally include outreach to the surrounding community.

There are many known benefits that derive from the internationalization of student experiences. These include developing international competence—including cultural and linguistic skills—and critical thinking skills among students (Breuning, 2005; Schattle, 2003; Rivers 1994) and promoting national security (Altbach 2002). Altbach summarizes these benefits thusly:

Traditionally, international education has been valued because it “promotes the attainment of self-knowledge, which is among the oldest objectives of education” (Stewart 2004, 159). Although this theme is prevalent in the literature on international education, scholars increasingly acknowledge that, in an interconnected and globalized world, the importance of international education lies not only in personal enrichment but also—and perhaps more crucially—in the attainment of intercultural competencies (Carter 1994; Kitsantas 2004; Lewis 1995). Intercultural competencies are defined by the ability to see both difference and similarity, to see both unique aspects of cultures as well as commonalities between them (Cushner 1998; Khoi 1994). Further, intercultural competencies are closely linked to the development of higher order thinking skills, which include the ability to perceive and understand different perspectives.

The APSA has made great efforts at “internationalizing” the political science discipline (Rajaee 2005). Two recent articles published in PS: Political Science and Politics have called for the greater internationalization of American political science (see Varshney 2004, Breuning 2005). However, these efforts have largely focused on recruiting international scholars as members of the Association. However, despite these efforts, remarkably little has been written regarding the first of Arum's (1987) areas of internationalization—promoting the international content of the political science curriculum. To be sure, these are not mutually exclusive areas—bringing in international faculty can do much to internationalize the political science curriculum. Breuning (2005, 435) touched upon the importance of internationalizing both the Association's membership and the classroom curriculum by arguing that:

Nonetheless, bringing international faculty to many cash-strapped, primarily undergraduate institutions, especially in the Midwest, presents special challenges. However, as Breuning (2005, 435) notes, exposure to international affairs in areas of the country such as the Midwest should be at least as important an educational priority as it is elsewhere in the country. Students in the Midwest have traditionally had less exposure to the world beyond the borders of their own country and are less likely to have traveled abroad. In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and aware of continuous but vague threats of terrorism, some students (and their parents) have become increasingly reluctant to study abroad. Despite the considerable diversity between Midwestern, primarily undergraduate, liberal arts institutions, lack of exposure to the world beyond the U.S. borders aptly describes their collective student body.

So how internationalized are the political science curriculum at primarily undergraduate institutions in the Midwest?¹

By answering our query, we hope to advance the discipline in two ways. First, identifying different curricular structures is consistent with the recent push toward developing the scholarship of teaching and learning in higher education (largely promoted by the initiatives associated with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching) to address issues of pedagogy and curriculum and investigate the context (particularly curriculum structure) in which learning takes place (see Boyer 1990; Hutchings and Shulman 1999). Second, we seek to identify those departmental and institutional factors (if any) that are associated with variations in curricular design. This latter goal, in part, can help identify the institutional roadblocks that may prevent curricular reform, and will be of practical interest to academics interested in revising the political science curriculum at their own institutions. Indeed, knowing the factors (i.e., institutional characteristics as well as other contextual features) that correlate with the degree to which political science programs expose their majors to international affairs may provide these programs with insights for their institution-appropriate structural design or redesign.

Method

To assess the various programs we first consulted the Carnegie classification system and identified the masters I, masters II, and primarily baccalaureate liberal arts institutions from the 10 aforementioned states in the Midwest. In total, we examined 283 institutions, of which 189 (67.7%) reported offering a political science major.²

The definition of a political science major included majors listed as “political science,” “politics,” “government,” and “political science and international relations.” Not included were majors defined as combination majors (such as “history and political science” and “politics and sociology”) nor interdisciplinary majors with a concentration in political science. This is because the Wahlke report (1991) did not speak directly to these majors, and we can thus expect them to be structured very differently than other purely political science majors.

There was wide variation in the size of the schools—the largest of these institutions had 16,121 undergraduate students and the smallest 567. Eighteen (9.5%) of the schools were in Iowa, 34 (17.6%) in Illinois, 20 (10.6%) in Indiana, 8 (4.2%) in Kansas, 17 (9.0%) in Michigan, 19 (10.1%) in Minnesota, 20 (10.6%) in Missouri, 7 (3.7%) in Nebraska, 26 (13.8%) in Ohio, and 20 (10.6%) in Wisconsin. One hundred thirty-five (71.4%) were private schools, whereas the remaining 54 (28.6%) were public institutions (see Table 1 for list of schools).

List of Schools with Political Science Majors and States in Which They Are Situated

Continued

We used each department's web site to examine the structure of the political science majors at these 189 colleges and universities. Since many students now narrow down their choice of colleges by examining institution and departmental web sites as a prelude (or sometimes alternative) to a campus visit, web sites have become an important tool for universities to advertise and explain their majors. While deriving data from university web sites may have its limitations, they do provide important insights into each university's offerings as well as an efficient way to gather comparative data.

Each college and university that has a political science major was coded for the characteristics of the major, the features of the department/discipline and the characteristics of the institution. The major coded characteristics were: the proportion of the total number of courses offered that included comparative or international content³

These courses include not only those on non-U.S. countries and International Relations (IR), but also courses such as “Political Economy” and “Comparative Political Parties,” and “Comparative Gender Politics.”

; the minimum number of courses a political science student was required to take that involved international or comparative content⁴

Expressed as a percentage of the total number of political science courses required for a political science major.

; the number of full-time faculty who have training in comparative politics or international relations⁵

Ideally, this would involve examining the academic background of the faculty. However, this was not possible, so as a second best alternative, we identified such faculty by both their list of publications (when available) and/or the courses they taught. Using a very permissive standard, even if a faculty member taught both American or IR courses AND American courses, they were counted as Comparative or IR faculty. This measure was expressed again as a percentage, with the ratio of Comparative/IR faculty over the total number of full time faculty in the discipline.

; and the number of geographic areas covered by the course offerings reported in college and university catalogs.⁶

These geographic areas included: Western Europe, Eastern Europe (including the former Soviet Union), the Middle East and Central Asia, East and Southeast Asia, South Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

In addition, we also included several “independent” variables that may correlate with variations in the degree to which a political science program offers international content. These involve both departmental/discipline characteristics such as the proportion of faculty that were Comparative or IR instructors and whether the political science program was administratively housed in a “combined” department (such as a department of history and political science or a department of social science, or behavioral sciences).⁷

Departments that were listed as “political science and international relations” were coded as political science departments, given their common genealogy.

This provided some indication as to the relative freedom political scientists have to construct their own curriculum. In addition to disciplinary characteristics, we also examined institutional characteristics, such as the total undergraduate student enrollment at the institution, the student/faculty ratio, and whether the school was a private or public institution. In addition, we examined the impact of whether the institution offered a separate IR or International Studies major. It is quite conceivable that the presence of such majors would increase the likelihood of IR or Comparative course offerings. On the other hand, political science disciplines may view such majors as a way of absolving the political science major of offering any international or comparative courses.

Finally, in order to discern the quality of the institution, we created a dummy variable of whether the institution was classified as “most or more selective,” by US News and World Report in their annual America's Best Colleges (2004); schools were coded “1” if they were listed as either most or more selective, and “0” if otherwise. We used this measure rather than other indicators of quality (such as faculty research productivity) because 1) unlike other measures this is an officially ascribed classification as opposed to one based upon subjective indicators; and 2) these institutions are more likely to market themselves as quality teaching rather than research institutions.

Results

Table 2 reports some basic institutional characteristics, as well as characteristics of the political science majors for the 189 colleges and universities. As indicated, most of the schools were private (71.4%) and most were independent political science departments (67.4%). A further 37% of the institutions were considered either most or more selective. Regarding the characteristics of the disciplines, the average total number of political courses offered by these colleges and universities was 33 (with a high of 112 and a low of 8) and the average percent of those courses that had either Comparative or IR content was 27.7% (with a low of 5% and a high of 59%). Further, the average number of political science courses required for a major was 10.27 and the average percent of those courses that had either comparative or IR content was 14.1%. On average about a third of political science faculty at primarily undergraduate institutions teach Comparative or IR courses (with 27 schools reporting no Comparative or IR full-time faculty).

Institutional and Disciplinary Characteristics

Figure 1 reports the frequency counts for the number of courses required for the political science major. As indicated, the modal number of courses is 10 (64 institutions) closely followed by 11 courses (49 institutions). One program required 14 courses and one required only six political science courses. Figure 2 reports the minimal number of Comparative or IR courses an undergraduate major must take to complete a degree. Although most programs require two courses (88 institutions), a fairly large number (29) require no comparative or IR courses for political science majors. Finally, Figure 3 reports the number of geographic areas covered by the course offerings of these 189 institutions. Many institutions offer a variety of area studies courses with the modal number of three geographic areas covered (with 43 institutions offering courses covering three areas, 13 offering five areas, and two offering six areas). However, 43 political science programs offered no courses covering geographic areas outside of the U.S.

Number of Frequency Counts for the Courses Required for a Political Science Major

Minimum Number of IR/Comparative Courses a Student is Required to Take

Number of Geographic Areas Covered by Course Offerings

What disciplinary/departmental and/or institutional variables correlate with the extent to which programs offer a higher proportion of Comparative or IR courses? Table 3 reports the results of a set of three regression analyses that examine the relationship between a number of independent variables and:

• the percent of total courses offered that are Comparative/IR (Model 1);
• the percent of required major courses that are Comparative/IR (Model 2);
• the percent of full-time faculty whose specialty is Comparative/IR (Model 3).

Coefficient Estimates for Three Models

In the first two models we examine the impact of the percent of full-time faculty who are Comparative/IR; whether the political science discipline is combined with other disciplines in a departmental structure, whether the institution is most or more selective (or otherwise); whether there is an IR or International Studies major separate from the political science major; the size of the institution measured in terms of total undergraduate student enrollment; the student/faculty ratio; and whether the school was private or public.

From Table 3 it is clear that the only variable that is related to the percent of course offerings that are Comparative/IR for both the total number of courses and for major courses is the percent of Comparative/IR full-time faculty. Interestingly, none of the other independent variables are related to course offerings, including measures of the size of the institution, whether it was private or public, whether the institution was more or less selective, and whether the institution offered a separate IR or International Studies major.

Model 3 uses the percent of full-time faculty who are Comparative/IR as the dependent variable. As indicated, none of the independent variables are related to the dependent variable in this model. This of course suggests that the percent of Comparative/IR faculty are not necessarily constrained by physical limitations such as institution size or institutional characteristics such as the level of selectivity or whether it was a private or public school.