This year, I taught a class entitled “The Western Tradition of International Relations, Theory and Practice” at Western University. In both terms, students write an encyclopedia-style overview of the major thinkers and works covered in the course. The assignments serve to practice effective and efficient writing, while also acting as exam review for each term. Additionally, the assignment had a built-in resubmission process to simulate the peer review process, given that many of the students hope to continue work in academia, research or policy analysis. For interested students, I offered the option for these overviews to be published in a blog.
The blog is now live and will serve to act as a database of international relations thinkers. As students volunteer their work and complete final edits, they will be uploaded, providing students with a publication to help strength their CV/resume. These entries also will serve to help them as they continue in their studies in Western University’s International Relations program. I also hope that the database, over time, will become a useful resource for scholars of international relations broadly and it will contain, in some cases, multiple entries on the same topics with content and analysis reflecting the different points of view and interests of the students themselves.
If you’re interested, you can find the link here: http://history2705.wordpress.com or click the link at the top of the page.
Oleksa Drachewych 