Student Work Gallery

These projects come from courses I teach and are shared with student permission. Any inaccuracies in interpretation are my responsibility as the instructor, not the students’. The assignments are designed to be creative and lighthearted ways of engaging with political science concepts, encouraging students to explore ideas through humor, storytelling, technology, and play.

Introduction to Politics - Final Creative Project

In Introduction to Politics, students complete a Final Creative Project where they design something fun and engaging to teach a political science concept we studied in class. Instead of a traditional exam or paper, students might create a short video, podcast, digital comic, photo collage, meme collection, or even a rap song. As part of the assignment, students are also encouraged to integrate AI tools to brainstorm, troubleshoot, or enhance their projects. This gives them hands-on experience in using emerging technologies thoughtfully and responsibly. Full assignment instructions [here].

Realism and conflict_Pizza.mp4

G. Pizza — Video on Realism

This student created a short video to explain realism, focusing on the U.S.–China–Taiwan conflict. To avoid stock images, they used Fliki’s text-to-image and text-to-video tools, generating original visuals and syncing them with narration. While the process required extensive trial and error, the final project demonstrates how AI can be leveraged to creatively communicate core international relations concepts.

M. Byrne — Video on Duverger’s Law

This student produced a video introducing Duverger’s Law and showing how it operates in different electoral systems, including the U.S., U.K., and Canada. They used Splice video-editing software to combine narration, recorded footage, and election materials. Although no AI tools were used, the project drew on multiple academic and media sources to present the theory in an accessible format.

Duverger’s Law_Byrne.mp4

L. Puchalski — Storybook on Voter Fatigue

This student designed a children’s storybook to explain voter fatigue. The story follows a character who faces frequent referendums and grows increasingly disengaged. To illustrate the story, the student used ChatGPT’s image generation tools, sometimes with detailed prompts and other times allowing the AI to interpret the page text. The result is a playful but effective demonstration of how repetitive elections can diminish participation and interest.

Voter Fatigue.pdf_Puchalski.pdf

Heuristic Cue_Wilcox .MOV.mov

S. Wilcox — Skit on Heuristics

This student created a short skit to illustrate how people use heuristics as cognitive shortcuts in political decision-making. They used ChatGPT to draft the initial script, which was then expanded and adapted before filming and editing. The video concludes with an explanatory segment, reinforcing the importance of heuristics in shaping how citizens process political information.

Comparative Politics – Bonus Meme

In Comparative Politics, students had the option to complete a bonus meme assignment for extra credit. Their task was to create a meme that illustrates a concept from the course. Students could use online meme generators or AI image tools, and they provided a short explanation of how their meme connects to the political science idea. These early bonus assignments introduce students to foundational ideas in comparative politics, such as the modern state, origins of statehood, and collective action, while giving them space to explore these concepts in a creative and accessible format.

This meme plays on the double meaning of the word “state.” Americans usually think of “state” as part of the U.S. union, while political science uses the term to mean a political entity. The meme captures the tension in this confusion through the classic “two buttons” dilemma.

This meme illustrates the concept of the tragedy of the commons, where individuals acting in self-interest overuse a shared resource to the detriment of all. By replacing “commons” with “comments” and depicting slow “community wifi,” the meme humorously shows how overuse depletes collective goods. (Created with an AI prompt)

This meme connects Thomas Hobbes’s theory of the social contract to contemporary humor. Hobbes argued that people gave up certain natural rights to form a state capable of maintaining order. The meme imagines this difficult trade-off as a Bernie Sanders–style campaign appeal, highlighting both the challenge of convincing people to surrender natural rights and the humor in translating a 17th-century idea into modern political language.

This meme addresses the concept of failed states, which often collapse into conditions resembling the pre-state “state of nature.” Since states are meant to protect against anarchy, the humor lies in the irony that when a state fails, it reverts back to an anarchical like society.

This meme draws on Charles Tilly’s theory that war-making and state-making are closely tied, with governments acting like organized crime groups that extract resources and consolidate power.

This meme highlights the common misconception between correlation and causation. Correlation simply means two events occur together, while causation means one directly produces the other. The humor comes from the visual metaphor of someone mistakenly thinking they are “moving the truck” (correlation) versus the person actually pushing it (causation).

This meme illustrates the free rider problem in collective action, where individuals benefit from shared goods or services without contributing to their provision. By imagining the social disapproval faced by a “free rider,” the humor captures the frustration communities feel when someone takes advantage without giving back.

This meme contrasts two classic perspectives on the state of nature. Thomas Hobbes, shaped by the turmoil of the English Civil War, viewed humans pessimistically and argued that only a strong sovereign could maintain order—captured in his phrase “homo homini lupus est” (“man is a wolf to man”). Jean-Jacques Rousseau, by contrast, imagined people as naturally good and believed the state should reflect the collective will of its citizens.

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