Speakers
24th IB Asia Pacific Annual Regional Conference
25 – 28 March 2010, Singapore
Ruth Van Reken
Ruth Van Reken is a second generation Third Culture Kid* (TCK) and mother of three now adult TCKs. Her first grandchild is a Ghanaian-born TCK. She is the author of Letters Never Sent, one of the first books written by an adult TCK examining the impact of his or her cross-cultural childhood.
For the last 25 years, she has worked extensively with other adults who also grew up among many cultures as they collectively sought to understand and use the gifts of their background while dealing productively with challenges.
Ruth speaks both nationally and internationally to parents, human resource professionals, educators, and other caregivers, on how they can recognize and develop the strengths of a cross-cultural childhood for the good of not only the individual TCK or adult TCK, but also as an asset to their organization, corporation, school, or community.
She is co-founder and past chairperson of the annual Families in Global Transition conference. In addition to Letters Never Sent, she has also written a chapter in Strangers at Home (Aletheia Publications) and Unrooted Childhoods (Nicholas Brealey/Intercultural Press). Ruth has co-authored Third Culture Kids: Growing Up Among Worlds (Nicholas Brealey/Intercultural Press) with David C. Pollock.
*a child who spends a significant period of time during his or her developmental years growing up in a culture outside the parents’ culture.
