Abstract
Our goal in this paper is to share the collective voices of 60 pre-service teachers who were engaged in projects designed to assist them in developing critical perspectives regarding the schooling of marginalized students in the United States. Teacher candidates who are working towards becoming elementary school teachers focused on the interaction between resiliency and advocacy as they developed four projects that asked them: 1) to reflect deeply about their own educational history and to describe available support systems; 2) to prepare scholarly accounts of adult individuals who entered the K-12 schooling system in the United States as young immigrants and to describe their challenges and achievements; 3) to document the experiences of first-generation college students and factors that enabled them to successfully obtain college degrees; and 4) to study educational issues that adversely affects economically marginalized students and to argue for specific solutions. By learning from teacher candidates reflecting upon their own educational journeys and experiences of others, our aim was to develop a deeper understanding of the impact of resiliency and advocacy on the role that teachers can play in ultimately making education a more equitable enterprise for all students. By presenting our findings we hope to better inform educators on ways to maintain their motivation to teach and manners in which they respond to social and economic injustices around them.
Presenters
Ali BorjianProfessor, Elementary Education, San Francisco State University, California, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Teacher candidates, Teacher preparation programs, Pre-service teachers, Perseverance, Advocacy, Resiliency
