Dr Tam Cane is an Associate Professor of Social Work in the Department of Social Work and Social Care at the University of Sussex, UK. With a commitment to addressing inequalities and promoting best practice within the sector, Dr Cane is a leading scholar working at the intersection of race, identity, and adoption. She is the first to examine HIV in the context of the UK adoption system, and her research generated key recommendations for more inclusive and supportive approaches for individuals living with HIV. Central to her work is the development of the BRAC²eD model, designed to reduce bias in the recruitment and assessment of prospective adopters from racialised and minoritised ethnic backgrounds. This innovative model has made a significant contribution to challenging and transforming systemic inequalities in adoption practice. Dr Cane is also the founder of the AFDiT framework, co‑developed in partnership with adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents with lived experience of transracial adoption. The framework provides a comprehensive tool to:(i) strengthen social work approaches to transracial adoption; (ii) support adoptive parents in building cultural awareness and intentionality in transracial parenting; and (iii) improve long‑term identity outcomes for transracially adopted children. AFDiT is now widely implemented across child welfare and adoption services in the UK, shaping more inclusive and culturally responsive practices across the sector. Dr Cane’s research has also focused on evaluating and enhancing the Lifelong Links programme, a pioneering initiative supporting adoptees to maintain meaningful relationships with their birth families and key relationships post‑adoption. More recently, in collaboration with Barnardo’s and Coventry University, Dr Cane and Professor Sariya Cheruvallil‑Contractor co‑conceptualised Safer Spaces; a framework designed to promote culturally sensitive practice for Black children in care.

Dr Cane serves as a Council Member of Nagalro, Chief Editor for the Children and Youth Services Review (Special Issue), a member of the CoramBAAF Research Committee, the Black Adoption Project, and Foundations’ adoption and fostering practice guidance research.

Jorg Delfos is a caseworker and coordinator at ISS Netherlands (Fiom), working primarily on Search for Origins and cross-border tracing cases. His work focuses on supporting individuals in navigating questions of identity, biological family ties, and historical records, often across different legal and cultural contexts.

He collaborates closely with international partners, archival institutions, and public authorities, combining careful analysis with attention to the personal impact these processes can have.

As a donor-conceived person himself, Jorg brings lived experience to his work. This perspective informs his awareness of the layered emotional and ethical dimensions involved in questions of origin and belonging.

Alongside his professional role, he has a strong interest in genealogy and archival research, reflecting a broader engagement with how personal histories and systems intersect in shaping identity.

Yen-chi Ting has been a social worker for over 30 years in Taiwan. For the first 4 years, she worked in a psychiatric hospital before spending 6 years protecting women from domestic violence and created a 24-hour hotline. The next decade of her life was dedicated to Domestic violence and Child Protection Service. Since 2013, she has have worked for Cathwel to coordinate adoption services as well as residential programs for children, teenagers and pregnant mothers.

Nicole Grech writes “I am 21 years old, born in Addis Ababa and adopted at nine months old alongside my non-blood-related brother whom I adore. We grew up in Malta with our mother and father, and we share an exceptionally close bond as a family. From a young age, education was always a priority in our household. I have always loved going to school, and today my brother is a business student and I am a third-year law student, continuing that passion for learning.

Languages and cultures have always fascinated me. I speak English, Maltese, and Spanish, and I also understand Italian. I enjoy reading books in Maltese and expressing myself through writing. I am also deeply interested in current affairs and politics.

Sport has also played an important role in my life. I used to play handball and football, and recently I have started training in rugby while continuing to go on consistent runs around the island. Public speaking is another passion of mine. My father, who worked as a newscaster and had many opportunities in public speaking, inspired me greatly, and I am proud to have inherited his confidence and enthusiasm for communicating with others.”

Mr. David S. P. Hillstedt-Asplund is a social anthropologist whose work focuses on intercountry adoption, qualitative research, cross-cultural competence, and the well-being of children, youth, and families. He recently served as a Case Officer in the Department of Post-Adoption Services at Adoptionscentrum in Stockholm, Sweden, where he supports adoptees and families in interpreting adoption documentation. Hillstedt-Asplund has held several anthropology research assistant roles at the University of California, Riverside and Stockholm University, where he supported faculty-led research and contributed to the translation of anthropological research into policy-relevant and practitioner-oriented contexts.

Lynelle Long is a Vietnamese adoptee and founder of InterCountry Adoptee Voices (ICAV), a global network advocating for adoptee rights and lived experience. She consults internationally with governments, NGOs and adoption agencies, contributes to books and policy papers, and represents adoptees at key forums, including The Hague and the United Nations. In 2022–23, she amplified adoptee and biological family voices on illegal adoption at the UN. She also serves on the USA-Australian led Interparliamentary Taskforce on Human Trafficking and as a Special Advisor to Swiss NGO, Child Identity Protection (CHIP). Lynelle drives systemic change through advocacy, storytelling, and collaboration.

Jesús Palacios, Ph.D. in Psychology, is a Full Professor of Developmental and Educational Psychology at the University of Seville. His teaching and research activities are related to child protection, particularly in the field of foster care and adoption. Visiting Professor at the Universities of Minnesota and Massachusetts (USA) as well as at Cambridge University (UK). He works in different countries to develop alternatives to institutionalization: foster care and adoption. Coordinator of the international network for the study of instability and disruptions in foster care and adoption. His latest book on adoption, The Adopted Child, was co-authored with Professor David Brodzinsky and published in 2023 by Cambridge University Press.

Zoe Pai has worked with Cathwel Service for over five years. She currently serves as the primary contact for post-adoption and roots-finding service inquiries, coordinating communication with international partner organizations and some adoptive families and adoptees. Her responsibilities also include providing interpretation support during adoption-related court hearings and translating pre-adoption child records, including care records and developmental reports.

Gera ter Meulen’s work focuses on making scientific knowledge about fostering and adoption accessible to policy-makers and practitioners. She has both professional and personal experience of international adoption. From 2008 to 2016 she coordinated ADOC, the Knowledge Centre for Adoption and Foster Care at Leiden University, close to the Chair of Adoption Studies, and continued this work in her private Knowledge Bureau ter Meulen. Gera ter Meulen scans the scientific research on adoption and foster care and enables the field to access relevant results through her website, newsflashes and presentations. For the 2016 EurAdopt conference, she conducted a study with Leiden University on the satisfaction of Dutch adult international adoptees. Based on her scientific expertise, she shared her critical comments on the Joustra report on abuses in intercountry adoption with the Dutch ministry and was awarded the Pieter de la Court Prize by the Dutch Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2022 for her scientific contributions to public debate.

Linn van der Meij is a project lead at INEA's Team Searches. INEA is the Knowledge and Expertise Centre on Intercountry Adoption in The Netherlands. Team Searches is setting up projects in countries of origin so that intercountry adoptees who are living in the Netherlands can search for information of their biological family.

Previously, Linn worked in capacity building programmes in the Middle East and North Africa at the Netherlands Court of Audit. As an intercountry adoptee, Linn integrates her lived experience into her professional practice. Linn searched for her biological family in 2012 and was able to meet her biological mother. As such she recognises the impact this process can have on one's forming of identity and feeling of belonging.   

Linn Ahlfors is a social worker specializing in post‑adoption support at Interpedia in Finland. She completed her Master’s degree in Social Work at the University of Helsinki in 2020. Linn has been part of Interpedia since 2016, and since 2018 she has focused her work on providing post‑adoption support to adoptees and their families.

Inge Demol works as director at Steunpunt Adoptie, a Flemish non-profit, government-subsidized expertise and post-adoption support center. She identifies the needs of adoptees and adoptive families and translates this into an accessible and professional service. She bases her work on scientific research and literature, but above all by the lived experiences of adoptees.

Eugenie Han Mi Rötjes‑Nicholls is a facilitator and connector, committed to strengthening human connections in complex and sensitive contexts. Her work centers on inclusion, relational safety, and multi‑partiality, actively acknowledging and validating multiple perspectives while remaining ethically grounded.As an adoptee, she brings lived experience to her work on adoption, identity, trauma, and recovery, combining personal insight with professional integrity to create spaces where diverse voices are seen, heard, and held with care. With over 35 years of professional experience, including 25 years working abroad in Africa and England, she relocated back to the Netherlands two years ago, continuing to build bridges between people, stories, and systems, grounded in balance and guided by the belief that connection supports reconnection and grounding, fostering coherence and belonging.

Sanna Romu is a social worker specializing in post-adoption support at Interpedia in Finland. She completed her Master’s degree in social work at the University of Turku in 2014. Sanna has been part of Interpedia since 2019 focusing on providing post-adoption support to adoptees and their families

Sandra Stendahl, who holds a Bachelor of Science in Social Work from Stockholm University, Sweden, has had an extensive career providing psychosocial support to various demographics. At the core of her interest lies supporting intercountry adoptees as they navigate difficult parts of their lives. As an employee at Adoptionscentrum, Department of Post Adoption Services, Sandra has mainly been supporting adoptees when reuniting with their biological and cultural roots. Sandra was adopted from Colombia and has both personal experience and has organized Motherland tours.

Eunique Pierre Van Doorsselaere works at Steunpunt Adoptie, a Flemish, government-subsidized non-profit organization. After four years of volunteering, Eunique now also contributes as an employee. Her work focuses on A-buddy, a project by and for adoptees. Through A-buddy, Eunique helps create spaces for connection by offering a listening ear to fellow adoptees and co-organizing events for adopted teens and adults.

Jan Way has been a social worker since 1975, working in a range of settings including hospitals, local authorities and adoption agencies. For the last 35 years she has worked in the adoption field, specialising in intercountry adoption and working as a senior manager for what is now Coram IAC. She now acts as the training advisor for the agency and as Panel Chair She has published several articles in journals on intercountry adoption and the issues and challenges that arise with these placements and runs specialist training sessions on these topics. In 2019 she was awarded an MBE for her work in intercountry adoption. Jan is also an adopted person and an adoptive mother, having adopted a daughter from South America. In addition to her daughter, who is now 38, she has two grown up birth daughters and three grandchildren, one of whom is adopted.

Satwinder Sandhu is the current Chair of EurAdopt and CEO of the Consortium of Voluntary Adoption Agencies (CVAA UK), representing member NGOs. His work involves leadership across the UK adoption sector in policy and practice. He has extensive experience in running intercountry adoption services. From 2019-2023 he was CEO of IAC- The Centre for Adoption (Coram IAC). He is a qualified social worker with thirty-years of work experience in adoption, fostering and children in public care.  Satwinder is passionate about how adoption needs to modernise and focussing this evolution on the needs, and experiences, of adoptees particularly through the lenses of diversity, equity, inclusion and social justice. Satwinder is a TEDx speaker and a member of numerous sector Boards, including the Rees Centre, University of Oxford. Satwinder was joint moderator at EurAdopt Copenhagen 2022 and moderator at EurAdopt Cambridge 2024.