‘Disruptive’ entrepreneur honoured

THE Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) will bestow its first Chancellor’s Award on self-proclaimed “disruptive educational social entrepreneur” and Maths Centre national executive director Sharanjeet Shan next week.

The inaugural award recognised individuals who had made a “substantial contribution to society as a whole”, NMMU Chancellor Santie Botha said. It will be awarded annually. Shan will be receiving the highest of NMMU’s honorary awards for her pioneering work in mathematics education and for tirelessly championing poor and marginalised communities.

“For the Maths Centre to receive such an award gives us an incredible opportunity to market our model to many different role players throughout the country, including all departments of education,” Shan said.

She said she believed that if the centre’s story reached others, “everyone can see why social entrepreneurs are disrupters of a kind – big time dreamers”.

Born in India and with a long and varied life there and in Britain, Shan wrote an autobiography, In My Own Name, at the age of 39.