Political scientists have long been concerned with public opinion towards politics and political participation. Despite the plethora of studies concerning opinion and behavior, there have been few systematic efforts undertaken to examine how political science courses affect students' opinions and political behavior. In this paper, some personal experiences of political science instructors at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) are described. This paper examines two distinct questions: (1) how particular approaches to classroom activities have been influenced by the campus environment and by characteristics of the student body; and (2) what impact the introductory political science course has had on several variables traditionally used to predict political participation, including individual levels of political interest, political alienation, cynicism towards politics, and knowledge of basic political facts. It is reported that introductory political science courses positively affect students' opinions towards politics, and thus increase their propensity towards future civic participation. (Contains 6 figures and 3 tables of data.) (Author/BT)