This qualitative study examines teacher educators' articulations about their beliefs and motivations for preparing the next generation of teachers. The study also explores how teacher educators conceptualise their roles as the teachers of prospective teachers. Employing case study design, the participants included 10 teacher educators who serve at a highly selective, public, research university in Turkey. The data were collected through semi-structured and in-depth individual interviews. Adopting critical pedagogy as the theoretical framework, the interviews were analyzed by content analysis method with the help of NVivo 10 qualitative data analysis software. The results showed that the teacher educators specifically saw their roles as enacting change, advocating for democracy, equity, and social justice, and promoting the improvement and welfare of societies, in an effort to bring more emancipatory educational practices in the society through pre-service teacher education. This study furthers our understanding of how teacher education programs could improve their professional preparation and practices to push the agenda for social justice and equity in K-12 schools. [This study was presented at the annual meeting of American Educational Research Association (AERA) in New York/USA between April 13-17, 2018.]