This dissertation is an analysis of four semesters/cycles of practitioner and participatory action research inquiry on my use of critically compassionate intellectualism (CCI)--a framework of critical pedagogy, authentic caring, and a social-justice curriculum and purpose--to humanize an educational foundations course for pre-service teachers in a large urban, Midwestern university. A critical interpretation of social justice teacher education requires an uncompromising commitment to challenge the structural and cultural conventions that continue to marginalize certain students while privileging others. This is most likely to be accomplished by foregrounding consciousness-raising, anti-oppressive, and humane principles not only as educational aims, but, importantly, as keys to educational practice. With critical pedagogical theory and relational-cultural theory as frames, I examine how my implementation of CCI influenced my policies, practices, and pedagogy, and what this meant for students' learning and other experiences in the course. Additionally, I explore how CCI guided my methodological choices in the original four cycles of inquiry, as well as this fifth cycle of critical qualitative analysis. Findings from the study show that students valued the respect and care they experienced through this framework and were able to envision affording their own students the same relational support, which many began enacting immediately in their accompanying field experiences. Most felt empowered to take charge of their own learning and goals, to become critically reflective practitioners, and wanted to act as advocates and change agents for their diverse students. However, certain structural and personal limitations hindered our ability to enact more physically engaged and proactive interventions that would have strengthened their CCI experience. In the final analysis, it was both in spite of and because of these imperfections that I was able to realize my own moral vision of socially just teacher preparation, where reflexivity, critical consciousness, and compassion became assets to both their learning and my own continuing growth as a teacher educator. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]