We are proud to announce the winner of the QuickBooks/Entrepreneur Magazine and Saturday Star Mompreneur Competition as Bathabile Mpofu of Nkazimulo Applied Sciences.  This mother of three is on a mission to improve the quality of science education in high schools and manufactures and supplies a mini science kit called ChemStart for use by learners at home, which includes 52 experiments – one for every week of the year – with easy instructions to carry out the experiments.  The company also visits disadvantaged schools to perform experiments free of charge and emphasises to learners how science knowledge is applied in real life, helping learners to relate what they learn in class to everyday living.

The judging process was not an easy one and all 90 entries to the Mompreneur Competition were of a very high calibre.  QuickBooks and all of our partners on this project wish to congratulate the entrants and to acknowledge their very worthy businesses – it is truly inspiring to be privy to the incredible Mompreneurs that South Africa has to offer and we wish them all well in the future.

Here Bathabile Mpofu’s and Nkazimulo Applied Sciences story:

Our mission is to improve the quality of science education in high schools. We manufacture and supply a mini science kit called ChemStart for use by learners at home. We also visit disadvantaged schools to perform experiments that are unsafe to put in a kit, free of charge. The idea came about because high school did not prepare me enough for what I was to face at first year university. I was completely overwhelmed and intimidated by what I was expected to be able to do in a laboratory. This is a tale of many learners in their first year of tertiary education, few as they are because fact is SA is not producing enough learners who will become engineers, doctors, science researchers, let alone science innovators. So to address this problem, we developed this kit. We emphasise that the learners understand how science knowledge is applied in real life helping learners relate what they learn in class to everyday living.

I am the embodiment of what a woman who has been empowered can achieve when they dare to dream and make their dreams a reality. I am from a previously disadvantages background but now have taken hold of the opportunities that have been made available to me. I am a wife and mother of 3 children ( ages: 15, 10 and 3 years). I am also a modular MBA (2015/16) student at UCT and I started a social enterprise in 2015 while I was still working full time and studying. Early this year I won a prestigious Total Startupper of the Year award which enabled me to take a leap into full time entrepreneurship. I should be a mompreneur because I am living testimony to many young people especially women who may think their humble beginnings define their future, whereas it is the courage to rise above your circumstances that determines your future. This country has many opportunities available in many forms.