This past Sunday, when players across the NFL wore cleats dedicated to an individual cause they supported for the “My Cause My Cleats” campaign, Denver Broncos long snapper Casey Kreiter took a slightly different approach to his own shoes.
Instead of advertising his chosen cause in a fancy design, he simply had QR codes affixed to the shoes that link to special video messages for the kids at Children’s Hospital Colorado and the University of Iowa Stead Family Children’s Hospital.
Happy to represent @CMNHospitals tomorrow and STEM education. Scan the QR codes for a personalized message to my heroes at @UIchildrens and @ChildrensColo #ForTheKids #TackleSTEM #IowaWave #MyCauseMyCleats @ColoTechAsn pic.twitter.com/A2OnC9tSIm
— Casey Kreiter (@caseykreiter) December 2, 2017
“Throughout my career, I’ve always done a little work with the children’s hospital, both in Iowa City and out here in Colorado, so I wanted to represent the children’s hospitals because they do miracles over at those places,” Kreiter told SportTechie in a phone interview.
“And the things those kids have to go through, just it’s not fair that they have to go through it, and those kids are truly my inspiration.”
So Kreiter made a personal video for the children in treatment at the University of Iowa Stead Family Children’s Hospital — which has this season become famous for the wave shared by the kids and the fans at neighboring Kinnick Stadium. There was another for Children’s Hospital Colorado.
The idea, which came from someone in the Broncos organization, materialized over just two weeks.
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Kreiter has a significant background in STEM. He was a substitute teacher at a school in Iowa City, where he previously played football for the University of Iowa Hawkeyes and earned a degree in science education. About a year ago, he used a BeamPro robot to remotely connect with his former students, and in March he helped students at a robotics competition at the University of Denver as part of a larger Broncos STEM effort.
“Before I became a Denver Bronco, I was still trying to make it in the league and had gotten my degree in science education, so I was substitute teaching at the Iowa City area in all kinds of classes, from foreign language to shop classes to math, English, really anything,” Kreiter said. “And then (I) ended up accepting a full-time science teaching job and my expertise was life sciences, so I was gonna teach biology and those courses, and then landed with the Broncos and the Broncos have a great STEM initiative that they put on. They call it Tackle STEM, and they put emphasis on it.”
Kreiter said his passion for STEM fueled his cleat design, but that teaching STEM to the children in the hospital was not a priority, although certainly a welcome byproduct.
“That wasn’t a main focus of mine, but inherently with the codes and what I did with the shoes, it’s going to do that, but I think that’s important,” Kreiter said.
As for future “My Cause My Cleats” drives, Kreiter intends to experiment with emerging technologies to see what he can do with a pair of kicks and a profound love of STEM. Kreiter wanted to use a 3D printing component in his cleats this year, but the timing didn’t work out: “We’re gonna start brainstorming much earlier for next year,” he said.
And when his playing days are over, he hopes to head right back to the classroom to teach the next generation of students the importance of STEM — with a bit of football mixed in for applied learning and good fun.