In South Africa, rural education and development are issues of social justice, especially in places that were previously established as homelands. This article presents some of the tensions that are inherent in the conceptions of rurality, rural education and the possibility of sustainable rural education and development. We propose the notion of education for rural development as a useful concept for its potential for transforming and sustaining rural education. We describe the implications of education for rural development on teacher education change by focusing on the teaching experience (TE) programme.