Dr Sheila Cannon wins Trinity’s Civic Engagement Award

Posted on: 15 June 2021

Trinity College Dublin has today awarded its annual Civic Engagement Award to Dr Sheila Cannon, Assistant Professor of Social Entrepreneurship at Trinity Business School.

The Trinity Civic Engagement Award recognises members of Trinity staff who have demonstrated outstanding achievements in engagement with wider society in their teaching and/or research as well as those who have played an active role in civic engagement in Trinity either through community based research and/or community based learning.

Dr Cannon has worked for Trinity for the past five years. She has worked with and supported 80 social enterprises in Ireland and internationally in various ways through teaching, research, and engagement.

Describing her activities, Dr Cannon said:

These organisations are on the front line of social justice, equality and inclusion. Activists and social entrepreneurs take risks and make sacrifices in their work towards equality, pluralism and sustainability.

Her research contributes to knowledge on how organisations influence and respond to socio-cultural change. Dr Cannon has focussed on organisations that aim to bring about a specific social change: peacebuilding to end violent conflict, beef farmers protesting policy that would alter their way of life and culture, the reproductive rights movement in Ireland and others.

As we celebrate Pride Month, a light was shone on her research of the LGBTQA+ movement. Dr Cannon has shown how a single organisation can respond to and influence taken-for-granted legitimacy: the norms, values and beliefs that shape what we think is right and proper.

Dean of Students, Prof Catherine McCabe said:

After much consideration and strong competition, we felt that due to Dr Sheila Cannon’s ability to harness the power of social enterprise and also contribute to policy, her work to enact societal change in a real and effective way makes her a worthy awardee.