Connecting rowing, math, science, and the world around us!

Neil Bergenroth is a lifelong science teacher and rowing coach. Despite hanging up his Tulsa Youth Rowing Association Head Coach cap in 2016, Neil wanted to continue his involvement in rowing. With his background in education, technology, and the sport, he saw an opportunity to bring STEM concepts into rowing and optimize the learning process for young people. 

All it takes is two!

In 2018, Neil - whose official title is currently Tulsa Youth Rowing Association Outreach Director - launched a pilot program at Nathan Hale Junior High; gROW Tulsa - an after-school indoor rowing program that incorporates STEM concepts into the programming, creating a fun and out-of-the-box experience for participants. Two kids showed up on the first day and became the nucleus of the program. Maya and Christina learned how to graph their rowing results, and use the force curve to understand their power application in relation to wattage and electrical power conduction.

“For many students, the sport of rowing is not accessible. The gROW Tulsa Rowing STEM outreach program provides students with access not only to the sport but also to related STEM concepts which, together, can enhance academic outcomes.”  

Enter the apps.

In 2019, Neil leveraged his tech knowledge to launch his first app, Rowing STEM. Using the force curve as inspiration, this free app captures 17 data points on the rowing machine. While using watts as a measure of power output isn’t the typical data point used by rowers, in an educational environment it helps to facilitate the connection between exerting energy on the rowing machine and generating power to conduct household devices. The app even comes with cool visuals so that when you generate a certain wattage, the image of whatever household item you’re powering comes up on the screen, like a desktop computer, the equivalent of rowing 100 watts, or a blender at 300 watts.

Building a Community 

In an effort to increase rowing opportunities for more youth, Neil recognized he needed additional people to use his STEM apps and curriculum, and provide feedback on them so he could learn, tweak and improve for a larger population. In his mind, it wasn’t as good as it could be, but it was a good starting point. 

“Rowing is such a fertile ground for teaching kids about these (STEM) competencies and the Concept2 is such a great tool for data collection.” 

With the gROW program up and running, Neil was able to leverage its success to apply for and obtain an ErgEd® grant. ErgEd® is a classroom-based indoor rowing education program that teaches school-age students the fundamentals of rowing and how to properly use a rowing machine. In partnership with the George Pocock Rowing Foundation, USRowing, and Tulsa Public Schools, Neil and the Tulsa Youth Rowing Association were able to secure and distribute 20 rowing machines amongst schools in the district, along with training for educators so that more kids were safely and effectively introduced to the sport of rowing. Over 70% of the student body at Tulsa Public Schools are Black, Hispanic, or Native American - groups that have not traditionally been able to participate in rowing. 

Thinking BIG.

Neil’s grand vision is to reach a global audience - he wholeheartedly believes that the connection between rowing and STEM has a value that should be available to everyone, from universities to environmental organizations. In fact, the next iteration of his concept is around collecting water samples from bodies of water that rowing clubs utilize, and testing the pH and oxygen levels of the water. The sky’s the limit and the outdoor environmental approach hasn’t even been considered yet. The goal is to simply get kids curious and thinking outside the box. 

Neil has built several more apps since Rowing STEM including Erg Dude (which, by the way, is also popular in Tunisia) and Erg Math. All of the apps and curriculum are free* - deliberately so. Neil simply wants to share rowing and wants to share STEM. Giving the data, the platforms, and the sandbox for educators, coaches, and kids to use, is enough for him if it grows the sport and increases kids’ interest in the sciences.

If you agree with this unique and innovative approach to connecting rowing, math, science, and the world, we invite you to share this blog post with your educators, fellow coaches, friends, and students, or reach out directly to Neil - he would love to hear from you. Let’s see how many points we can accumulate as a team on Erg Dude ;)

*Erg Dude has 2-minute games that are free, and for longer games a small in-app purchase is necessary.