Books: Purchase packet at Copies on Campus; * material is in packet. Politics in Minnesota: The Directory, 3rd ed, is recommended (will be in bookstore when available); or substitute Official Directory of the Minnesota Legislature or Minnesota Legislative Manual (blue book). Also each student should own a grammar reference book and a style reference book as described below. In addition, each student should read either the Star-Tribune or Pioneer Press on a daily basis. And you should regularly access the Minnesota Legislature's Web page at http://www.leg.state.mn.us/

Internship: It is your responsibility to arrange an internship with a member of the Minnesota legislature for this session. If you have not already done so, contact the House or Senate internship coordinator immediately. They will attempt to secure a member for you. If you have secured a member on your own, you still must register with the coordinator. Also please tell the instructor which member you will be working for. The work done for the internship will provide the field experience and data which you will analyze with political science theories and tools. The products of that analysis will earn academic credit as described below.

Requirements: The learning in this course will come from participating in and observing the legislative process in Minnesota and from reflecting upon those experiences. Some learning will occur on your own, some from talking with legislators and staff, some from "debriefing" (recording your thoughts in a journal, sharing your observations with fellow students), and some from the analysis and writing of a term paper.

Term paper: 70%
Class Participation: 10%
Journal: 2 x 10 = 20%

A,	93 and above
A-,	90-92
B+,	88-89
B,	83-87
B-,	80-82
C+,	78-79
C,	73-77
C-,	70-72
D+,	68-69
D,	63-67
D-,	60-62
F,	under 60

Term Paper: This paper should analyze some aspect of the legislative process and incorporate your observations and a modest amount of outside reading. It should also include interviews with at least two knowledgeable sources, e.g., a reporter, a committee chair, a staff member. You might, for example, analyze a particular piece of legislation (how a bill became a law), a particular committee, or a particular stage of the legislative process (how legislators get information). Or you might focus on specific legislators, e.g., women, party leaders, freshmen, committee chairs, rural members. Or you might concentrate on legislative interactions with constituents, lobbyists, reporters, staff, bureaucrats, the governor's office etc. The paper is not a chronology of what you did in your internship position, nor is it a library research paper; rather it is a politically sophisticated analysis of some aspect of the Minnesota legislative process. Examples of successful term papers in the past can be found in the class folder outside my office.

The paper should be approximately 20 pages long; it is due 2 weeks after the end of the legislative session. It will be critiqued and returned to you ASAP; the revised and final draft is due 2 weeks after receipt. Late papers will be penalized; no paper will be accepted after August 1, 1999. Term papers must be double-spaced, on one side of the paper only, and written in the English language in a professional manner. Pages must be numbered; there must be a title page; there must be a bibliography. You must purchase and use a writing handbook such as Strunk and White, The Elements of Style, and a style manual such as Turabian, A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations or The University of Chicago Press, A Manual of Style. By Feb. 8 you are to turn in a prospectus--an outline of the topic you have chosen and what kinds of data you will gather. Within two weeks you should meet with the instructor to discuss your plans. By March 1 you must turn in a bibliography of at least 5 sources you will use in your paper; you may need to meet with the instructor about further sources.

Examples of past term papers are available outside the instructor's office.

Journal: You are to keep a journal in which you record your insights about the legislative process. You must make at least 3 entries per week. The journal is to be brought to class EACH week; the instructor will randomly select journals to be graded. They will be returned on the following Wednesday. This exercise counts 10% of the grade, and grading will be done twice during the quarter. Use the journal as an opportunity to demonstrate what you are learning about the legislative process as result of your daily activities. Report your observations as well as make sense of them. What substantive knowledge are you gaining about public policy? Later use your journal as a data source for your term paper.

Class Participation: Class attendance is MANDATORY as is participation in various "debriefing" exercises each week; students will be excused only with a doctor's note. Each class activity counts 1% of the grade. The class will be conducted as a seminar and will include an oral update on your experiences, a lecture and discussion of the topic for the week, and oral or written exercises.

Participant/Observation Methodology
Read: *Fenno, "Observation, Context, and Sequence," American Political Science Review, 80 (March 1986); *Wagner, "Field Study as a State of Mind," ch. 1 in Borzak, ed., Field Study; *Suelzle and Pasquale, "How To Record Observations: Writing Field Notes," ch. 10 in Borzak.

Read: *Hanson, Tribune of the People

BRING GRAMMAR AND STYLE HANDBOOKS TO CLASS

Read: Politics in Minnesota: The Directory, 3rd ed.

Read: The Directory
PROSPECTUS DUE

Read: *Rosenthal, Drawing the Line, chs. 5,7

BIBLIOGRAPHY DUE

Read: *Mahtesian, "The Sick Legislature Syndrome and How to Avoid It," Governing, February 1997: 16-20.