Spring 2027

Contemporary American Political Thought

Contemporary American Political Thought examines central themes and controversies in American political thinking during the 20th and early 21st centuries.

offering recorded3–4 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Aleisha Lachette

Summary

1 / 3

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2020: 3.56 GPA, 88.9% A/AB (n=72 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.39 GPA, 68.8% A/AB (n=48 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.68 GPA, 89.6% A/AB (n=48 letter grades).

What you’ll be able to do

  • Explore American Political Thought from the progressive era to the present day.

  • Discuss the progressives; New Deal liberalism; and different strands of conservatism after World War II.

  • Examine communitarianism; multiculturalism; and recent political rhetoric.

  • Analyze issues of race, gender and class in the 1960s.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

Sophomore standing and (POLI SCI 160 or ILS 205)

POLISCI 361

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027
Historical instructors & teaching patterns

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 510
DIS 302Classroom Instruction0 / 170
DIS 303Classroom Instruction0 / 170
DIS 304Classroom Instruction0 / 170

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2020: 3.56 GPA, 88.9% A/AB (n=72 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.39 GPA, 68.8% A/AB (n=48 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.68 GPA, 89.6% A/AB (n=48 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

No workload feedback recorded.

Topics

  • Development of liberalism from the Progressive Era to the New Deal to the Great Society and beyond
  • Emergence of new strands of conservatism after World War II and tensions between those strands
  • Challenges by excluded and marginalized groups to the traditional social and political order
  • Revival of concerns about “community” in America

Skills

  • Explore American Political Thought from the progressive era to the present day.
  • Discuss the progressives; New Deal liberalism; and different strands of conservatism after World War II.
  • Examine communitarianism; multiculturalism; and recent political rhetoric.
  • Analyze issues of race, gender and class in the 1960s.

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
POLISCI 361 · Spring 2027

Contemporary American Political Thought

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
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  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:778:015988",
    "course_id": "POLISCI 361",
    "course_uid": "course_04bfa79971d8303e831f14c4",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "015988",
    "source_subject_id": "778",
    "title": "Contemporary American Political Thought",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 4,
    "typically_offered": "Occasionally"
  }
]
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Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

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Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "90b12b4d09c551c74332054c3c7d15fce273c7d09a56547b8738a91c3dbfbece",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}