Prof. Bogdana Crețu Darie PhD of the I.L. Caragiale National University of Theater and Film, Bucharest, Romania
Bogdana Darie Crețu is a professor, PhD. Coordinator, Dean of the Theater Faculty at the I.L. Caragiale National University of Theater and Film, Bucharest. She is the coordinator of the UNATC Junior Program and also of the Continuous Training of the Teacher Program in Applied Theatre for Children and Teenagers. Also she is the scientific advisor of the process of obtaining grade I and II in the preacademic educational system, editor in chief of the UNATC Journal of Drama Teaching and coordinator of several educational projects, national and international conference on the theme of theatre in educational and pedagogical improvements in the field of theatre and preacademic curriculum structure. She is an expert collaborator of MEN. Bogdana is an actress, collaborator with Bulandra Theatre, The National Theatre Bucharest and with the National Theatre Craiova, stage director and an editor in chief, publishing academical papers.
Assoc. Prof. Ioana Petcu-Pădurean PhD of the George Enescu University of Arts in Iași, Romania
Ioana Petcu-Pădurean is an Assoc. Prof. at the Faculty of Theater at the “George Enescu” University of Arts in Iași, theater critic and author of several books on theater and film theory: The Followers of Thespis(2012), Imaginary Dialogues with Film (2015), History of Romanian Theater – course (2018), Fragmentarium with Shakespeare (2019). A member of the International Association of Theater Critics and the European Shakespeare Research Association, she is the author of several studies and articles in academic journals at home and abroad. Among the most recent may be mentioned Shakespearean bodies in movement: Central and Eastern European and American Echoes on Dance Stages (in “Cahiers Élisabéthains”, 2024), Researches in Maurice Maeterlinck’s Theater Works (in “Theatrical Colloquia”, 2023) and How Do You (Still) Like Shakespeare? Romanian Playwrights Under The Sign Of The Bard (in the volume Spatial Readings and Linguistic Landscapes, 2022).
Prof. Svebor Sečak PhD of the Alma Mater Europaea Dance Academy in Ljubljana, Slovenia
Professor Svebor Sečak PhD is a regular member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, a national ballet principal and ballet master/pedagogue of the Ballet of the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb, Croatia and the Dean of the tertiary educational institution Alma Mater Europaea Dance Academy in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He teaches at the AMEU Dance Academy in Slovenia and at the Study of Ballet Pedagogy at the Academy of Dramatic Art of the University of Zagreb. He is also the President of the Croatian Society of Professional Ballet Artists. He is the organiser and moderator of the dance section of Scientific International AMEU Conferences It’s About People, and as a member regularly participates at international congresses of CID UNESCO. He publishes, edits and reviews articles for the conferences and for other relevant journals and magazines.He is the recipient of many professional awards, prizes and state orders for his contribution to culture. In 2022, he was accepted as a regular member into the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, particularly due to his holistic approach to ballet art in all of its segments – educational, academic, artistic cultural and social.
Prof. Zoia Guțu PhD of the Academy of Music, Theatre, and Fine Arts in Chișinău, Moldova
Zoia Guțu is a Master of Arts and teaches at the Academy of Music, Theatre, and Fine Arts in Chișinău (Moldova), where she heads the Department of Choreographic Art and Motor Performance. She successfully defended her PhD thesis in the field of pedagogy at the Moscow Academy of Pedagogical Sciences in Russia. She is a member of CID-UNESCO, President of the Alliance of Choreographers of the Republic of Moldova, member of the Union of Musicians of the Republic of Moldova, member of the Theatrical Union of Moldova, member of the Teacher Certification Commission of the Ministry of Education, member of the National Curriculum Council of the Ministry of Education, and member of the Accreditation Council of Educational Institutions of the Ministry of Education. In recent years, she has been the scientific supervisor of ten doctoral theses. She is the founder of Polydance, an ensemble of the Choreography Department at AMTAP.
Assoc. Prof. Emilia Oprișan PhD of the University of Bucharest, Romania
Emilia Oprișan, PhD, is an Associate Professor at the University of Bucharest’s Faculty of Psychology and Educational Science, with 13 years of experience teaching psychology and special education subjects. She has expertise in working with children with special needs, abused and abandoned children, adults with trauma, mentally challenged children, autism, Down syndrome, and cerebral palsy. She has published numerous studies and books such as Introduction in Psychotherapy, Neuromotor Deficiency – basic concepts from psycho-pedagocical perspective, Psychopathology of Addictive Disorders, Pervasive Developmental Disorders, Pervasive Developmental Disorders, Conditions and Interventions in Stress Avoidance, A Few Variables of Influence in the Concept of Marital Satisfaction., and has been involved in various projects, including the NEWTON Project.
Richard Coaten, dance movement psychotherapist, UK
Richard Coaten, PhD, is a Dance Movement Psychotherapist and Churchill Fellow and is based in the UK where he worked for 16 years in Old Age Psychiatry Ward and Community based services for the NHS in West Yorkshire. His doctoral level researches completed in 2009 involved the application of Dance Movement Psychotherapy with people living with dementia and their nursing staff in a ward-based setting. He is passionate about the overlap between arts in health and the arts psychotherapies and the need for more collaboration and dialogue especially now and his recent researches have created a new chapter on the subject in his role as co-editor of ‘Creativity in Arts, Health and Dementia: a practice handbook’ for publication by JKP in 2025. A co-edited publication in 2022 called ‘ A Practice Handbook of Living with Dementia’ by PCCS books was selected by the Reading Agency in 2024 to go into all public libraries in the UK under the ‘Reading Well for Dementia Scheme’. Richard is on the private practice and supervisor registers for ADMP UK and represents the organisation as their delegate to the EADMT a role he has fulfilled for the last 8 years. He is also helping train the next generation of DMPs in Romania.