My name is Ruth Luman and my biography began at Emmanuel Hospital in Turlock on December 13th, 1971. I have lived most of my life in the Turlock area and consider it my hometown.

After graduating from high school, I attended Biola University in La Mirada as an Intercultural Studies major. During my time at Biola, I had the opportunity to study abroad in Germany and in Cambodia. While in Cambodia, I taught English at a dental school and studied the Cambodian language intensively. This was a great experience for me, because I learned that I really enjoyed teaching English and the process of acquiring a second language. It was at this time that I decided to return home and go to graduate school to obtain a degree in T.E.S.O.L. (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages).

During my time in graduate school, I taught ESL (English as a Second Language) classes part-time at Biola University and worked as a professor's assistant.  I also had time to get married in the middle of it all to a very good friend from high school. After graduating from Biola in 1996 with an M.A. in TESOL, I taught ESL for UCLA Extension and Long Beach School for Adults.

After my husband graduated with a degree in Public Health, we decided we wanted to use our skills overseas in a developing country. Cambodia was closed at the time due to a coup d'etat, so we moved to Mekelle Ethiopia, the regional capital of the northern region of Tigray. My husband worked as an epidemiologist for the regional health bureau while I wrote an English course for health professionals and helped a development agency start a new college preparatory school.

We returned to the States from Ethiopia in April of 1998 and settled in Turlock.