Social Justice Standards in Teacher Education: Pre-Service and In-Service Teachers' Successes, Struggles, and Futures

Teacher education has increasingly situated social justice as a critical outcome in their programs. One resource, the Social Justice Standards (SJS), has been identified as a guiding tool for supporting pre-service teachers (PSTs) to plan for and enact social justice-oriented practices in their teaching. Situated in the context of a rural teacher education program at a predominately White institution (PWI) in Texas, this qualitative study explored the perceived successes, struggles, and future considerations of five pre-service and in-service teachers in using the SJS. Findings illustrate students' varied conceptualizations of social justice and their mixed feelings of confidence, anxiety, fear, and unpreparedness to actualize it in their future teaching.