Teaching AZ Politics & The State Legislature in SPGS: Simulations in State Politics

Education in state politics is critical for undergraduate students in the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University. At our four-year universities, the only Arizona state politics courses that are taught are to fill teacher certification requirements. This project intends to propose alternative pedagogy to an existing Arizona State University course titled POS 417 - "Arizona Politics". Through reviewing the literature surrounding discipline-based learning, simulations, and active learning findings concluded that students benefit from engagement and active participation in simulated activities, in addition to longer retention of material. In addition to literature, interviews with two former practitioners and responses from a short student attitude survey coincided these findings. Overall, SPGS and Arizona State University would benefit from a simulated Arizona state politics course being available to them.