Welcome to the CU Boulder Graduate Program

The Political Science Department at the University of Colorado, Boulder has a long tradition of excellence in training graduate students. At CU, a diverse faculty of nearly thirty train graduate students to conduct original research in five substantive areas of political science: American government and politics, comparative politics, international relations, political theory, and public policy. Approximately 150 prospective students apply each year: we admit about fifteen new students each year, ensuring a high faculty-student ratio and close mentoring opportunities.

The faculty at CU-Boulder pursues rigorous research that contributes to theory development in political science and addresses real world challenges. In American politics, our faculty specialize in Congress, the U.S. Supreme Court, federalism, local politics, and how identity, emotions and social networks affect attitude formation, voting behavior, political participation, and campaign politics. In comparative politics, our strengths reside in comparative political economy, comparative political behavior, the politics of non-governmental organizations, Asian politics, Latin American politics, and European politics and the European Union. Our international relations faculty analyzes international institutions, international monetary policy, conflict, security, and peacemaking. Our political theory faculty focuses on environmental and social justice, the justification of war, citizenship, and diversity. Our public policy faculty takes an analytical approach to urban policy, environmental policy and resource management, the military, social welfare, and education policy.

Our department is distinctive for encouraging and supporting collaboration. Recent initiatives crossing traditional subfield lines include environmental ethics and policy, political economy, local politics, comparative judicial institutions, political mobilization and participation, ethnic conflict, emotions and political attitudes, social networks, identity politics, and gender. Our rigorous, multi-method orientation contributes to a highly visible research profile and a growing international reputation. In the past three years alone, our faculty has published articles in the top-ranked journals in the discipline, including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, Journal of Politics, and International Organization. In addition to the top journals, our work regularly appears in the top academic presses: Cambridge University Press, Duke University Press, Oxford University Press, Princeton University Press, Routledge Press, and University of Chicago Press.

These collaborative, multi-method orientations also characterize our graduate training. With a wide array of courses in each of the subfields, students can explore their varied interests and discover the topics and methodologies best suiting their skills. Along with standard courses within subfields, we offer a series of unique graduate courses “team-taught” by two professors—from different subfields—in areas such as political behavior, political economy, and political institutions. There is a long history of faculty-graduate student collaboration on scholarly publications and research proposals as well as collaboration among graduate students on publications. Methodologically, we offer courses in advanced statistical analysis, network analysis, game theory, comparative case study methodology, and context-sensitive research methods. To supplement offerings in the department, we encourage – and provide financial support for – additional methodological training which includes but is not limited to summer programs such as ICPSR at University of Michigan (ICPSR) and the program in Empirical Implications of Theoretical Models (EITM). Along with additional support for methodological training, the department provides summer stipends to cover travel related expenses (both international and domestic) for work related to the student’s dissertation. The department also provides financial support for conference attendance and grant writing.

The graduate program is the life-blood of the department. In addition to working closely with faculty, our graduate students created their own peer-mentoring program for professional development. Each graduate student participates in our Teaching Political Science seminar and many are involved in the campus-wide, nationally-recognized Graduate Teacher Program. The talent in our graduate student community is reflected in recent external awards: we have had multiple winners of the National Science Foundation (NSF) Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grants, Boren Fellowships, Fulbright awards, and post-doctoral fellowships at Harvard and Yale.

The faculty works closely with graduate students to assist in the placement process. Of those who choose to work in academia, our placement record is nearly 100%. Over the years, our students have obtained tenure track positions at Cornell University, Emory University, Florida State University, Oregon State University, Rutgers University, State University of New York, the Air Force Academy, Texas Tech University, University of Arkansas (Little Rock), University of California (Los Angeles), University of California (San Diego), Essex University, University of Iowa, University of New Mexico, University of Nebraska, University of South Dakota, Purdue, and the University of Georgia. We have also placed students in high-level liberal arts colleges and universities, such as Wesleyan, Gonzaga, Colorado State University, University of Colorado (Denver), Metropolitan State College of Denver, Brigham Young University (Hawaii), Middlebury College and California Polytechnic University. Finally, some alumni have taken positions as analysts for the Colorado Children’s Campaign, the Department of State, the Department of Defense, USAID, the National Defense University, and the State of Colorado.

We are pleased you are considering the graduate program at CU-Boulder. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at pscigrad@colorado.edu.