MUT is on record for its views on student entrepreneurship. Two of the University management staff have been recognised for their efforts in encouraging students and staff to get involved in entrepreneurship. Professor Marcus Ramogale, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Learning and Teaching, won an award for his role in inculcating business into the minds of the students.
The seed that has been planted is sure to germinate well and quickly after a visit by a man who firmly believes that student business is a way of life, and this is how the high rate of unemployed youth and graduates should be dealt with. Professor Michael Twum-Darko, National South African Entrepreneurship Venture Builder (SAEVB) manager from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), while addressing students and staff at the University, said the visit to MUT on 6 March 2025, was part of the THENSA South African SAEVB Roadshow. The purpose of the Entrepreneurship Venture Builder Roadshow was to create business opportunities for students to have their businesses while they are still studying. “This is a new eco-system mainly to integrate existing entrepreneurship and innovation activities infrastructure and related resources in a manner that accelerates student entrepreneurship development in existing Historically Disadvantaged Institutions (HDIs),” said Professor Twum-Darko. The core of the SAEVB is the Mentor-in- Residence programme, called MiR, to capacitate THENSA partnering institutions with a structured programme to train university staff to become mentors for students’ entrepreneurial development.
Professor Twum-Darko, said every interaction should result in a business venture. He said the roadshow was to bring awareness to all stakeholders at the University as to how the SAEVB works and seek management support to entrench it as an institutional entrepreneurship development landscape. He said they aimed to close all gaps, accelerate the commercial level of student innovation, and promote student start-up businesses. He said the big push was a response to desperate times.