By Surbhi Bhatia
SURREY (British Columbia): Ivneet Bains, the 21-year-old Indo-Canadian boy from Surrey, British Columbia, has received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal this year.
Ivneet got this award for running an entrepreneurship initiative Math4me, a mentoring organization which helps young Canadians achieve academic and personal excellence.
The medal is another addition to the long list of awards this young genius has earned from Canadian Government and various other organizations, in a very short time since he moved to Canada. He sets an example for all those who feel it is impossible to achieve your dreams in a short span of time in a new country.
Ivneet came to Canada only in 2007 with his family from Mohali in Punjab.
“Ivneet has been a brilliant all rounder since childhood. He is a cricketer, musician and a theatre artist. When I realized his talent needed more exposure, I decided to move to Vancouver,” said Haropinder Bains, Ivneet’s father.
He proved his genius in Canada too. After entering Panorama Ridge High School in Surrey, he gained confidence volunteering with Surrey’s parks department, joining the school’s drama program and becoming a star batsman in the B.C. Mainland Cricket League.
In grade 12, he earned 100 per cent in math, calculus, physics, biology and chemistry, and in 2009 received the Governor General’s Academic Medal for Excellence.
A business student at the University of British Columbia, he was offered full scholarship from the university.
“It was during my first year, I realized the need to help youth in their academics. I founded Math4me initiative,” he said.
Math4Me helps Grade 3 to 12 students improve their math, science and English skills, and links them with volunteer work to better themselves and the world.
“We discovered teens today are too distracted. They are either on social networking sites or playing XBox. They do not have any goal in their lives. It was important to solve these problems first before giving them tuitions. We developed personal mentorship in which a student is motivated to study through different approaches like meditation, Yoga, etc. They are then asked to sit down and discuss their long term goal and what they want to achieve in life,” Ivneet said.
“Our main goal was to provide affordable and effective tutoring to every student in our community. Hence, we started as low as $8 / hour for students in grade 8,” he said.
Having received over 100,000 in scholarships, Ivneet aspires to help students achieve their maximum potential all over Canada at school and beyond.
“I am absolutely honored and humbled to receive this award,” said Ivneet.
“I am highly grateful to the wonderful team at Math4me and all the parents who have put faith in Math4me to help us
improve students’ lives.”
Ivneet was also awarded the Student Entrepreneur of the Year award by the Surrey Board of trade to recognize the positive impact of Math4me in the community. He was also given Top 20, Under 20 award by a national not-for-profit organization Youth in Motion in 2011.
Where does Ivneet get inspiration to juggle between so many jobs?
“They are my passions not jobs so I enjoy doing different things,” he said.
Congrats Ivneet Bain! But maybe not the youngest, my daughter, whom is Canadian, was 11 years old when she received the Queens Diamond Jubilee Medal.
I feel proud of Ivneet Bain!s achievements. He is really a talented boy.Besides his parental guidance, he has Gods blessings. The students in Canada are bound to benefit immensely from his way of learning.