Classrooms without Borders: using academic service learning to enhance pre-service teachers' understandings of diversity and difference

The development and first phase of implementation of a new pre-service teacher education initiative at the University of Western Sydney (UWS) called 'Classrooms without Borders' (CwB) commenced in 2010. As an academic service-learning subject in the Master of Teacher (Primary) CwB placed 300 students in various roles in a range of designated community agencies. The focus of these agencies is to support disadvantaged communities including those from Indigenous, refugee, culturally and linguistically diverse, and economically disadvantaged backgrounds.