Speakers
24th IB Asia Pacific Annual Regional Conference
25 – 28 March 2010, Singapore
Each day will contain one or two keynote addresses by leading global visionaries. The current speaker list includes Greg Mortenson (co-author of “Three Cups of Tea”), Professor James Tooley (Privatization of education expert), and Wade Davis (Named by the National Geographic Society as one of the Explorers for the Millennium).
R
uth 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. READ MORE ...
Wade Davis
Wade Davis is an Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society. Named by the NGS as one of the Explorers for the Millennium, he has been described as “a rare combination of scientist, scholar, poet and passionate defender of all of life’s diversity.”
An ethnographer, writer, photographer, and filmmaker, Davis holds degrees in anthropology and biology and received his Ph.D. in ethnobotany, all from Harvard University. He has received two Honorary Doctorates, from the University of Victoria in 2003, and from the University of Guelph 2008. READ MORE ...
An internationally known scholar, James Tooley is Professor of Education Policy at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England. He was the founding President of The Education Fund, Orient Global from 2007 to 2009, and the founder of the E. G. West Centre at the University. For his ground-breaking research on private education for the poor in India, China and Africa, Professor Tooley was awarded gold prize in the first International Finance Corporation/Financial Times Private Sector Development Competition in September 2006. READ MORE ...
George Walker was director general of the IB from 1999 until his retirement in 2006. He studied chemistry at Exeter College, Oxford, UK and gained both MA and MSc degrees. He then studied music at the University of Cape Town. After teaching science at Watford Boys’ Grammar School he won a Salters Institute scholarship to carry out further research at the University of York, UK and was then appointed lecturer in the university’s department of education. READ MORE ...
Greg Mortenson is the co-founder of Central Asia Institute and founder of the international service-learning program Pennies for Peace. Born in 1957, Mortenson grew up on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. His father Dempsey, founded Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center (KCMC). His mother, Jerene, founded the International School Moshi, which has been an IB world school since 1977. Mortenson served in the U.S. Army in Germany (1977-1979), where he received the Army Commendation Medal, and graduated from the University of South Dakota in 1983. READ MORE ...