Time Warner Cable employee Tunza Wallace, right, works with three students as part of a national initiative to get more black children excited about science, technology, engineering and math. (Photo: Glenn H. Burkins for Qcitymetro.com)
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Imagine a tire that never goes flat. Or a climate-controlled jacket that adjusts with the weather. Or maybe even a line of waterproof clothing.

Those were just some of the ideas offered up Tuesday when employees of Time Warner Cable asked 50 local Boys & Girls Clubs members to think like inventors.

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To celebrate Black History Month, the cable company has launched a nationwide initiative to encourage more African American children to get excited about science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). The program, called “Wouldn’t it Be Cool If…,” is part of the company’s “Connect A Million Minds” initiative.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, African Americans account for 12 percent of the U.S. population and 11 percent of all students beyond high school, but in 2009 they received just 7 percent of all STEM bachelor's degrees, 4 percent of master's degrees, and 2 percent of Ph.Ds.

The Time Warner Cable program challenges youth ages 10-15 to imagine cool inventions and submit those ideas to www.wouldntitbecoolif.com by March 28. Finalists will present their ideas to a panel of judges that will include hip-hop recording artist will.i.am. One winner or winning team will be selected to work with an innovations firm to take their idea from conception to completion.

At the Boys & Girls Club on Belmont Avenue, small groups of students huddled with members of the Time Warner Cable Black Business Employee Network to brainstorm ideas. But first they gathered to hear about some of the black American inventors who changed the course of history — inventors who often go unsung in many history books.

In one group, 12-year-old Nijai Evans, a student at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School, proposed the idea of a climate-controlled jacket.

“If you are playing basketball,” he said, “you wouldn’t have to take off your jacket.”

In another group, three boys — Myles Taylor, 9, David Reid, 12, and Sharrief Jones, 9 — were imagining a “Takie Wear” clothing line. The waterproof clothing, they explained, would change colors when garments come into contact with water, resulting in a mismatched ensemble on a rainy day.

Coincidentally, their Time Warner coach, Tunza Wallace, said he and some friends had recently launched a clothing line for sororities.

“It can be done,” he said. “If you take your idea and work on it and believe in it, no one can stop you from bringing your idea into production.”

Ebony House, vice chair of the Time Warner Black Business Employee Network, said Tuesday’s effort was the first time the 125-member group had worked with children since it was formed about a year ago.

“It was time,” she said, rattling off a list of historic black inventors. “We did more than invent the peanut. We did more than play ball. Our kids don’t always see that.”

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