Prof. dr. Ladislav Bognar was born in 1942 in Slavonski Brod in Croatia. He finished Secondary Teachers’ Training School in the same town. After finishing his secondary education he was a teacher in primary school for ten years. In the same time he studied pedagogy at Philosophical Faculty in Zagreb. When he finished study of pedagogy he was hired as school advisor in Požega and than as pedagogue in School Institute in Osijek. Today he is a professor at the Teacher Faculty in Osijek. The title of his master’s degree was "Play in Early Schooling", and of Ph.D. degree was "Model of Primary School in Conditions of Self-managed School System".

His research work has three periods. The first one was a project "Small village schools with different pupils' age in the same classroom". In several experimental schools around Požega teachers practised a new way of teaching. Second period was devoted to obtaining changes of early schooling. This project is known as "Model of Early schooling of Osijek". The purpose of the third one was creating a new model of primary school. Before the war in Croatia he conducted changes in four schools around Osijek in which a new educational approachwas applied . After that he organized experimental research in two Slovenian and two Croatian schools in which teachers, parents and pupils had a chance to create an "Innovative School". He was active in peace education and promoting humanistic approach in education. Today he leads a project  entitled “Creativity in lifelong teachers’ education”

He has published 12 pedagogical books and 70 other articles in Croatia and other countries. He is a member of the European Forum for Freedom in Education.