About Sheri 

Shéri Brynard (43) is South Africa’s only qualified assistant teacher with Down syndrome, earning her N6 Educare diploma without any special assistance. For over 15 years, she has worked at Lettie Fouché School, supporting learners with special education needs and advocating for the rights of people with Down syndrome.

As a speaker, Shéri has delivered over 950 speeches, including at the United Nations in New York and Geneva. She addressed nearly all the International Down syndrome congresses worldwide, and she received scholarships to address prestigious events like four Women’s Leadership Symposium in Oxford. She represented persons with Down syndrome at the T21 Research Conference in Rome, attended by about 1000 delegates. She also addressed the “World Inclusion Conference” at the Cambridge University in England and she was invited to do a lecture too staff and students, at the at the Anglia Ruskin Cambridge University. A key note address at a conference of the Royal Society of Medicine in London was another highlight for Shéri. The President of the Human Rights Council at the UN in Geneva congratulated Sheri on her speech focusing on the support persons with disabilities can give, and not just receive, after her most recent presentation in Geneva in 2025.

Shéri’s media presence includes interviews on national TV in South Africa, Greece, and New Zealand, as well as her own radio program. Her autobiography, Sheri, Just the Way I Am, was published and nominated for The Andrew Murray-Desmond Tutu Prize.

Shéri’s work has earned her the World Down Syndrome Day Award, when she received international recognition for her impact on people with intellectual disabilities. This was also the reason for her to be awarded the Presidential award for a person who has done most to improve the lives of persons with disabilities in South Africa. This was after she was chosen out of 1400 nominations, as Shoprite Checkers Woman of the year (Youth Movers) in South Africa. She became the first Shoprite Checkers Woman of the Year with a disability as well as the first winner ever to receive a standing ovation.

Sheri’s contribution, on what “a family means to people with Down syndrome”, was used on the Dsi web site and  her contribution of a flight alone to a conference after Covid-19, was used in the ‘news’ section of Dsi (read the article)  In July her video to motivate people with Down syndrome internationally to get vaccinated, was used on the web page of Dsi:  watch the video on the right and in August she was a key note speaker at the “World Conference on Advanced Nursing” in London, on a webinar.