Brooklyn Nets’ Jarrett Allen teams up with 4-H to Educate Kids On STEM

Brooklyn Nets rookie Jarrett Allen has always been a strong advocate for innovation and tech. He believes that it is vital that young people become engaged with the STEM subjects, as children are the future and so is technology.

His passion for sport and technological innovation has found him teaming up with 4-H, an organization that educates and mentors young children. In 2018, Allen has met with groups of children for a tech-centered activities on numerous occasions.

Most recenlty, Allen and the 4-H kids worked to develop a wearable that would help him play smarter on the court. What they built was a sensor that could be worn on his wrist to track on-court steps.

“It’s almost like building a computer basically,” Allen said, “I have a passion for that so doing this small thing was pretty fun. “STEM education is great for kids because they’re our future and technology is going to be our future. So if we can teach everybody how to use it and how to make it work, then that’s going to be good for the future.”

Allen thanked 4-H for letting the team of young engineers come in and teach him how to build a fitness monitor, and hoped that the advancement in technology would eventually have a greater impact within the professional game.

This isn’t the first project that 4-H has put on for educating students in the STEM field. Last September, the organization held a 4‑H National Youth Science Day where kids designed their own wearable fitness trackers. This was through a partnership with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln whose teams created kits of materials that could be used for creating.