[BC3331] Colloquium: American Political Decisionmaking

Don't let the course title deceive you. You won't actually learn anything in this class, except possibly in my opinion the fact that the people who gave Professor Pious tenure must never have sat in on his class. I spent the entire semester listening to other students read aloud their papers on various programs to combat world hunger via the UN. You could say that this course gave me a taste of the mind-numbing bureaucracy and cliquishness of slow-moving international committees. Yawn.

If you're tired of traditional political science classes and willing to work hard, then this is the class for you. It's syllabus is one of the most creatively designed at Columbia and if you can manage to get your name on the enrollment list, which is generally capped around 12, then you have to take this class. If you're not on the list, don't bother showing up since spaces never open up. The class simulates an advisory group to the President and Pious expects you to learn everything there is to know about the policy area you cover. The upside is that you will become an expert in a policy area that interests you; the downside is that you will do more work for this one class than you ever thought was possible. At the end, you will have produced a 50 page document, learned an incredible amount about political strategy and been privileged enough to both take a class with, and get to know personally, one of the best professors at Columbia.