Teachers Without Borders?

Teachers Without Borders? is the story of four Indian teachers who came to the United States in the face of tremendous personal and professional odds to teach in urban schools. Their experiences are brought to life in this groundbreaking empirical study through interviews with their principals, district representatives in charge of recruitment and orientation, recruitment agency personnel, and union representatives, as well as in-depth classroom observations and student commentary. This well-researched work raises an essential question: If international teachers face daily exploitation, a lack of personal and professional support, and a lack of pedagogical and cultural preparation, are they able to give urban students the high-quality multicultural education they need and deserve?

Book Features:

• An engaging case study that tackles competing discourses about immigration, globalization, and teacher quality.
• The voices of international teachers highlighting the successes and challenges of their experience and comparisons to teachers in other cities across the country.
• An examination of the differences in student and teacher expectations and how these influence teaching and learning.

Alyssa Hadley Dunn is an assistant professor of urban teacher education at Georgia State University.

“This extraordinary book documents the advent of hiring international teachers to fill shortages in urban schools.”
—Ann Lieberman, Stanford University

“This is an excellent and important study.”
—Carl A. Grant, Hoefs-Bascom Professor, University Wisconsin–Madison

“Teachers Without Borders? underscores the need for teacher educators and district personnel to incorporate culturally relevant pedagogy into their programs and professional support.”
—From the Foreword by Jacqueline Jordan Irvine

“In this highly readable case study, Dunn exposes how the rhetoric of ‘cultural awareness’ used to justify hiring temporary international teachers masks a deeper devaluation of teachers, students of color, and pedagogical knowledge.” —Christine Sleeter, professor emerita, California State University, Monterey Bay, and co-editor of Teaching with Vision: Culturally Responsive Teaching in Standards-Based Classrooms

"Teachers Without Borders? will transport you through the local and the global, interweaving nuanced portraits of teachers from abroad with troubling unveilings of the bigger picture behind teacher recruitment and school reform. Insightful, passionate, and expansive, this book is a must-read."
—Kevin Kumashiro, University of Illinois at Chicago, and author of Bad Teacher! How Blaming Teachers Distorts the Bigger Picture

“In this brilliantly rendered case, we see the human consequences when advocates adopt profit-driven strategies, assume quick-fix solutions, and embrace an arid view of teaching and learning. We can also glimpse pathways toward creating a system capable of educating all children in our wildly diverse democracy.
—William Ayers, educator and bestselling author of To Teach, Third Edition, and co-author of Teaching the Taboo

“Teachers Without Borders? opens a new window on the complex realities of cultural literacy in our schools, the challenges of culturally responsive pedagogy in our classrooms, and the still promising opportunities for reform today.”
—Jeff Biggers, author of State Out of the Union: Arizona and the Final Showdown Over the American Dream

“This highly readable and moving book couples compelling case studies with hard-hitting social and political critique. In a sensitive yet unflinching analysis, Alyssa Hadley Dunn exposes the complex economic, professional, and humanitarian issues involved in international teacher recruitment. Although many readers will not be aware of this problem before reading the book, they will never be able to forget it once they do.”
—Marilyn Cochran-Smith, Cawthorne Professor of Teacher Education, Lynch School of Education, Boston College