Boost Your Language Teaching Skills – trainers
Information about the new CercleS training programme offered in 2025
The team of the following trainers are looking forward to working with you.
Your trainers – skilled, diverse and highly committed
Marta Demchyshyn
Marta is an educator with over 20 years of experience in teaching English and English for specific purposes, with a particular focus on English as a foreign language. She holds a Master’s degree in English Philology and Literature from Lviv National University, Ukraine. She is the Deputy Head of the Centre for Modern Foreign Languages at the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv.
In her current role, Marta is responsible for course development, lecturing, and performance assessment. She has led numerous educational initiatives, such as English summer schools and language proficiency test development, and regularly conducts professional development sessions for faculty at her university. Her commitment to professional growth extends internationally, where she participates in various teacher training projects, professional conferences, and Erasmus+ mobility programmes.
As an active member of the European Confederation of Language Centres in Higher Education (CercleS), Marta collaborates with language professionals across Europe. She has a deep interest in educational innovations and constantly seeks to implement new methodologies and teaching approaches. Marta is especially passionate about the social aspects influencing language development, pluriculturality, and concepts of national identity, exploring how these factors shape the learning experience and cultural understanding within her field.
Tetiana Kibalnikova
Tetiana is an Assistant Professor at the Medical Department of the Language Centre of Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic. She holds a higher education degree specialising in English and German, a Master’s degree in English Language and Literature, and a PhD in Ukrainian Language from Volodymyr Vynnychenko Kirovohrad State Pedagogical University, Ukraine.
Before joining the Language Center at Masaryk University in September 2022, Tetiana served as Associate Professor at the Department of Foreign Languages and Teaching Methodology at the Volodymyr Vynnychenko Central Ukrainian University, Kropyvnytskyi, Ukraine. She also held managerial roles there including Head of the Department (2021–2022) and Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Foreign Languages (2005–2007).
As a part of the Language Centre team, Tetiana engages in pedagogical, organizational, and research activities. Her primary responsibilities include teaching ESP to medical students, monitoring and assessing their academic progress, creating tailored assessment tools, and designing course materials to meet the specific needs of healthcare professionals. Additionally, she actively contributes to the academic community by presenting her work at conferences, sharing insights on curriculum development for ESP in medical education. The scope of her research interests encompasses the topics of academic writing, mediation, and course design.
Barbara Sawicka
Barbara Sawicka holds a Master of Arts in English Philology and a PhD in Language Assessment from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland. From 2010 to 2024, she was the Deputy Director of the Centre of Languages and Communication (CLC) at Poznan University of Technology (PUT). During her tenure, she participated in several significant projects, including the CEFR Companion Volume Implementation Toolbox (VITbox) project from 2020 to 2022, which aimed at applying CEFR tools in language teaching, learning, and assessment. Since 2021 she has been involved in the EUNICE – European University for Customised Education project, fostering interactions between educational institutions, industry, business partners, and other stakeholders.
Barbara has extensive experience in teaching English for Specific Purposes at a technical university and has participated in numerous national and international conferences and professional training. As an author, Barbara has written articles on the teaching, learning, and assessment of languages for specific purposes in higher education, and developed online courses for students of electrical engineering, power engineering, and physics at PUT. She also co-authored a textbook “English for Electrical Engineering”, published by the Publishing House of Poznan University of Technology in 2017.
Barbara is a member of several scientific organisations, including the Polish Association of Modern Languages (PTN), the International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language in Poland (IATEFL), the Association of University Language Centres (SERMO), the European Confederation of Language Centres in Higher Education (CercleS), and the Network of University Language Testers in Europe (NULTE).
Sabina Schaffner
Sabina Schaffer was the Director of the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich Language Center until October 2024. She holds a Teaching Diploma for French and Russian in high school education, a doctorate in Russian Literature from Freiburg/Fribourg University, and a Master’s degree in Coaching and Organisational Development from Northwestern University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland.
Born close to the (language) border in Basel, Switzerland, Sabina has always been deeply interested in transitions and in switching between languages and cultures. She is fascinated by people’s stories and passions, and loves supporting personal development. Before taking up the managerial position at the Language Center, Sabina worked as a French and Russian teacher in high schools, as a project manager in a teaching trainer project in Poland, and later as a lecturer for Polish at the Slavonic Department of the University of Basel, and as a teacher trainer and head of the Life-Long Learning Section of the Academy of Adult Education in Lucerne.
From September 2019 until September 2024, Sabina was president of CercleS, and from 2008 until 2018, co-president of the Association of Language Centres at Swiss Higher Education Institutions SSH-CHES-CSUS (https://ssh-ches.ch/en/). Sabina is also a member of the Swiss professional association of coaches BSO (Berufsverband für Coaching, Supervision und Organisationsberatung).
Along with her managerial job at the Language Center, Sabina has worked as coach and trainer in higher education. Her research and working interests are language policy, organisational and quality development, and coaching and leadership and teacher training in higher education.
Julia Zabala Delgado
Julia Zabala Delgado holds a Master’s Degree in English Philology from the University of Valencia, a PhD in Language and Technology from Universitat Politècnica de València, and a Master’s Degree in Language Testing from Lancaster University.
She is the Deputy Director of the Language Centre at the Universitat Politècnica de València, General Secretary of the Spanish Association of Language Centres in Higher Education (ACLES), and President of CercleS.
She is actively involved in national and international networks and associations and has collaborated on numerous international projects throughout her career. Her primary areas of expertise include language testing and assessment, the development of assessment tools, teacher training and professional development, and the CEFR and its Companion Volume.
