Political Science Departments Report Declines in Enrollments and Majors in Recent Years

Abstract

Trends in undergraduate student enrollments and degrees in political science over the last 15 years is a good news/bad news story. The bad news that provides the current headline is generating lively exchanges among political science faculty on the PSRT-L since May. It may be that, with the considerable increase in high school graduates expected over the next decade, the decrease in students selecting political science courses and majors will turn around. But many reasons offered by faculty for the decline are worth explicating and examining especially because enrollments in Ph.D. programs are increasing, necessitating an expansion, not a contraction, of faculty positions. Data from the APSA's Annual Survey of Political Science Departments for the 1980 through 1995 academic years are presented here in order to inform faculty discussions and responses to the fall off in student interest in political science.