This narrative inquiry explores the experiences of LGBTQ+ teacher candidates of color in a teacher education program. Composed of vignettes written by teacher candidates and narrative analysis to frame the significance of and contexts within which the vignettes were written, this study first offers insight into the ways teacher candidates…

Working to combat, speak back to, and shift discourses concerning issues of genders, sexuality/ies, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and 2-spirit (LGBTQ2) identities in school classrooms and curriculum, this article highlights the capacity in building more inclusive elementary classroom spaces through tinkering in teacher education.…

This article describes a study that investigated preservice teachers' understandings and self-efficacy related to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer (LGBTQ) students and families. The preservice teachers indicated a broad range of understandings in relation to LGBTQ terms. They reported a relatively high sense of self-efficacy in…

Our study provides examples of how critical curricula and social justice education can be brought together to inform teacher education. Building upon our ongoing longitudinal study, which investigates the impact of an integrated LGBTQ awareness program, we focus in this article on five pre-service teachers who identified critical incidents in…

Teacher education programs play a significant role in shaping pre-service English teachers' pedagogy. The incorporation of texts with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual/transgender, intersex, and queer/questioning (LGBTIQ+) perspectives in the curriculum is one mechanism for promoting inclusion as well as a means to address and combat homophobia…

Critical challenges facing teacher educators at faculties of education is how to prepare teacher candidates to see schools situated in larger social contexts and support their ongoing learning as social justice advocates. Anti-oppressive work that challenges the marginalization of Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual, Transgender, Two-Spirited, Queering and/or…

This multisite case study explores how rural principals in high poverty schools in a Southern state that had identified themselves as social justice leaders perceived student diversity, specifically LGBTQ students, and how they sustained a socially-just school climate for all students. Using a qualitative approach lent itself to understanding the…

There are increasing calls for pre-service educators to be responsive and responsible for anti-homophobic education. This research builds on the ongoing efforts to integrate Positive Space training in our two-year Bachelor of Education programme. We found through a series of focus group and individual interviews that pre-service teachers were…

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, and ally (LGBTQQIAA) students are not commonly discussed in teacher education programs. Issues related to LGBTQQIAA learners need to be addressed in schools and in teacher education programs. Extant research shows that LGBTQQIAA students often face hostile school climates,…

This paper presumes teachers play crucial roles in making more just societies and teacher educators must decide how they will participate in and/or shape a global dialog about LGB rights with pre-service teachers. This paper utilizes Fraser's theory of justice to consider curricular change. It examines the values and experiences pre-service…

This research describes the impact of an integrated training program (Positive Space I and Positive Space II) on pre-service teachers' understandings of and abilities to create safe spaces for lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgendered, two-spirited, queering and/or questioning (LGBTQ) youth and allies in schools. Our Bachelor of Education program…

With an ever growing diverse population and access to new technologies, it is no revelation that education is undergoing a significant transformation in the twenty-first century. What remains a struggle is equipping students to meet modern expectations while trying to provide a platform for learning that does not perpetuate the same inequalities…

This interview-based essay explores how a teacher-training program, while ostensibly dedicated to the idea of teaching for social justice, completely neglected issues of homophobia and heterosexism. How did silence around queer issues leave a dedicated group of young, queer teachers-in-training without the academic, intellectual, or psychological…

In this analytic conceptual essay, and from her standpoint as an African American woman teacher/researcher, the author presents a rich description of a personal sensibility and promising professional practice for literacy educators and those who prepare Reading/English/Language Arts teacher candidates for service among students who are…

In spite of its short history, education that is inclusive of LGBTQ issues has developed in three major paradigms: (1) safety; (2) equity; and (3) critical theory. A review of research and program evaluation of teacher education with regard to LGBTQ reveals only a limited number of studies--most of which fall within either the safety or equity…