The European Union (EU) has been in the news a lot recently, mostly due to the financial problems of some of its member states. While these reports about the EU’s economy are interesting and the subject matter is important, students don’t always care much for the fine details of international economics. Despite the convenience of being able to travel with just one currency through the Eurozone, to many students the EU seems one big opaque mess: countries bailing each other out and welfare states under pressure, while heads of government are, well, butting heads. For professors charged with teaching the EU, the problems may lie more in the fact that the EU is rife with procedures, institutions, and processes that are tedious and sometimes downright boring to explain.

To make the EU more approachable to students and to lighten up the often technical discussions of how the EU “works,” maps come in handy and provide interesting information.  For example, EUpedia’s maps of Europe contain information like the legal status of cannabis in EU member countries and the legal age to drink alcohol. Such facts are not only likely to capture the interest of students who are planning a backpacking trip or a study abroad program in Europe, but also illustrate two crucial points about the EU: first, that a lot of diversity exists among the EU member countries; second, and related, that the EU does not regulate everything within the boundaries of its member countries.

A good tool for students to brush up on their geographic knowledge of Europe is this interactive map with 48 questions prompting students to identify countries. It provides immediate feedback and keeps track of the score. The map provided by nationsonline also has rudimentary information about all countries. The BBC’s interactive map is paired with a timeline of major events in the EU’s history. Together, these websites add some interesting facts and provide visual help that makes studying the EU more fun.

Speaking as an editor with a traditional college publishing background, I can tell you that I’ve always considered the legislative process coverage in American Government texts to be the toughest section for an author to tackle. And the artwork intended to illustrate the process, which invariably takes up an entire page of textbook real estate, rarely helps matters.

Enter Sunlight Labs, an offshoot of The Sunlight Foundation, whose Design for America contest has resulted in some truly rich infographics showing how a bill becomes a law. The post summing up the contest results is here. The six entries are here and all are downloadable. Mike Wirth’s winning entry, which features what Nathan Yau at FlowingData describes as boardgame-like, has been featured on a number of go-to sites for quality infographics, including Good, Cool Infographics, and The Infographics Showcase.