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Creative course topics that reference pop culture figures can help with student engagement and learning.
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Welcome to class. Today we’re talking about aliens.
Professors are increasingly turning to famous figures who appeal to students to make content more relatable. A 2023 Student Voice survey by Inside Higher Ed and College Pulse found around half of students enjoy using case studies to learn, connecting content to real-world problems or scenarios.
Research points to the value of pop culture–infused courses as a way to boost student motivation to learn and to decrease anxieties around difficult concepts. Recently, Taylor Swift has emerged as the peak of academe’s superstar reference across disciplines, with courses focusing on her songwriting, pop culture, economics, Spanish, gender and media and her personal life and career.
Inside Higher Ed compiled four courses taught at colleges and universities that draw on outside subjects students may be interested in to promote learning and engagement.
A Case Study
Professors at Ohio State University trialed the use of superheroes to improve student learning of anatomy to see if there was a material difference in how students engaged with content.
A study found that, when using superhero examples, students were more likely to be motivated to learn and had a deeper understanding of the material.
Researchers theorize that making a difficult course more interesting, such as through pop culture references, can benefit students’ mental health by making coursework more approachable and less stressful.
Loyola Marymount University—Bad Bunny and Resistance in Puerto Rico
First launched in 2023, the course is housed in Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies and Film, Television and Media studies, covering Puerto Rico’s history and culture through the life and music of Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny.
Students learn about Bad Bunny—legally Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio—his personal life and how his work challenges ideas of race, gender, sexuality and U.S. territorial dominance over Puerto Rico, according to LAist.
Course participants say the topic challenged their ideas of Bad Bunny and his music as well as their previously held ideas of Puerto Rico and the U.S.’s influence on the island.
Portland Community College—From Film to Real Life? UFOs, UAPs, Government and the Media
While maybe not quite as popular as hit singers on the radio, unidentified flying objects are fascinating the students of Portland Community College in the new course, which launched in spring 2024.
The noncredit course is offered online and provides an in-depth analysis of new congressional interest in UFOs, testimony to a secret UFO program and what learners can gather from media coverage of the events, according to the course description.
Colorado College—Queen Bees, WannaBees and Mean Girls
A half-block class launched in 2015 at Colorado College offers students deeper insight into teen movie sensation Mean Girls as well as other iconic girl groups and duos throughout history, including Elizabeth Bennett and Miss Carolin Bingley from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and Arachne and Athena from Greek mythology.
The course compares Mean Girls to Machiavelli with a hint of Joan Crawford in the 1955 film “Queen Bee” and how women are represented throughout film, literature and pop culture.
Ohio State University—Vampires, Monstrosity, and Evil: From Slavic Myth to Twilight
Appropriately filed under the popular culture studies minor at Ohio State, SLAVIC 2230 introduces students to the embodiments of evil in East European folklore and how it transitioned through European and American culture.
The course fulfils general education requirements for cultures and ideas or diversity in global studies and leaves students with a better understanding of folklore, the function of monsters in culture, beliefs about death and diseases and, of course, the modern vampire.
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