Globalizing teacher training: embedding global education perspectives in multi-disciplinary pre-service teacher programs

This study presents an overview of the issues involved when a group of teacher educators implement a global education focus across a variety of education programs at their university. Although these problems and issues arose from the global education agenda, some of the lessons learned and problems encountered can be applied to teacher educators in other fields. These experiences provide a glimpse into the teacher educator world – a world of compromise, of learning to deal with different masters with the work mediated by university and accreditation authority expectation and requirements, of applying lessons learned from school sites to a tertiary environment and making theory fit into practical amendments and additions to existing program structures. These experiences encompass the personal dilemmas, the professional learning and decision making, and the political dimensions of their work and provide a case study in professional co-operation and collaboration in the service of an ideal of encouraging a global perspective in a new generation of teachers.