Teacher Education for Social Transformation and its Links to Progressive Social Movements: The case of the Landless Workers Movement in Brazil

This paper discusses the experience of a teacher education program that has been developed by the Landless Workers Movement (MST), one of the largest and most important social movements in contemporary Latin America. The MST has struggled for agrarian reform as well as social and economic justice in Brazil. One of the lessons that the MST has learned from its history in Brazil is that it is not enough to struggle only for land. Education is also a quite important dimension of the MST's struggles. The MST's pedagogy is linked to collective work and the construction of humanist and socialist values. The movement has established pre-service and in-service teacher education programs for those who teach at schools in its settlements and encampments. This paper discusses, then, the challenges and possibilities of teacher education programs linked to progressive social movements in their attempts to implement an effective social justice agenda.