Abstract
Experiential learning is an exciting way for political scientists to show students the immediate relevance of the work they are doing, as well as to use our colleges and universities as a venue for engaging with and enhancing our communities. This paper explores the possibility of using project-based learning in political science classrooms as a way to enhance experiential learning. Project-based learning focuses on using projects as a way to structure classroom experiences. Projects invite students to collaborate in teams on authentic, open ended problems, conducting research and sharing the outcome with significant stakeholders. The goal of the paper is to: a) explore the possibilities of project-based learning for social science in general, and political science in particular; b) offer an assessment of the ability of project-based learning to complement more traditional forms of experiential learning such as service learning.