Dean at the Faculty of Socio-Human Sciences of the “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu, qualified to conduct Ph.D.s in the field of “Education Sciences”.
The main scientific fields he deals with are inclusive education, non-formal education, differentiated pedagogy, curricular adaptation, cognitive and metacognitive intervention, social inclusion, and training of trainers.
In these fields, he has held positions as project manager, member of research or training teams of projects, and coordinator of ERASMUS+ programs, as well as a member of national and international associations and societies. He has also produced numerous scholarly works – single-authored, coordinated, and collaborative, aiming to support the work of teachers and educators.
IMPLICATIONS OF MENTORING IN NON‑FORMAL EDUCATION ACTIVITIES
The dynamics of educational reality have resulted in different ways of providing non-formal education. This has made it more important in educational theory and practice and has increased educational and legislative public interest in the professional development of teachers through non-formal education-specific methods. Teachers must consider the educational potential of all forms of education, and the unique opportunities they provide and should also continuously develop specific skills to effectively utilize these opportunities, in order to positively impact the cognitive, metacognitive, and non-cognitive growth of learners and to achieve their educational objectives.
As a result, there have been efforts to make mentoring activities more professional. This includes training mentors to support and organize non-formal education approaches for the teachers they are mentoring. As non-formal education continues to grow, mentoring in non-formal activities plays an important role in professionalizing mentoring activities. The authors point out that it is helpful for the mentor to participate alongside the mentee in all the important stages of non-formal education activities to ensure successful implementation: during the stage of needs analysis and awareness of the need for non-formal education activities; while working on designing non-formal education activities; during the developmental stage of the non-formal education program; during the implementation or running phase of the non-formal education activity; while evaluating the phase of the non-formal education activity.