By Rodney Brown

Dean Kamen has to be given credit for trying to make his science education nonprofit FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) more hip. He even recruited Black Eyed Peas frontman and all around supernerd will.i.am to help get the word out that loving science doesn’t mean you are a loser.

To that end, FIRST just announced it will be airing a one-hour TV special on ABC called “i.am.FIRST – Science is Rock and Roll” on Sunday, Aug. 14. In addition to Kamen and will.i.am (would our last-name-only style make that i.am or just .am?) appearing will be Willow Smith and CTO of the United States Aneesh Chopra, who has connections to the Bay State as a Harvard University grad. The star power of will.i.am will also draw “special appearances” by celebrities like Justin Bieber, Jack Black, Bono, Miranda Cosgrove, Miley Cyrus, Josh Duhamel, Britney Spears, Snoop Dogg, Justin Timberlake and Steven Tyler.

The release announcing the special, however, doesn’t say whether or not those special appearance will be live or pre-taped “science is cool!” messages. The former would have much more impact than the latter, in my opinion – any kid out there smart enough to be interested in science is also smart enough to guess that half of the celebrities are just mouthing what they were told to say. No, we don’t need any more mouthpieces, but we could use some celebrities that really are nerds and/or scientists to step up to the plate like will.i.am has.

So I am calling you out, Natalie Portman. Anyone who has a psychology degree from Harvard University (with a 4.0 GPA no less) should be up there on stage with Kamen and will.i.am, spelling out to the kids everyone hopes will be watching why studying science is fun. You too, Vin Diesel – while you don’t have a science degree (an English major at Hunter College) you are known as one of the biggest Dungeons & Dragons fans out there. If someone who is cool enough to go toe-to-toe with The Rock in his latest movie can be a D&D nerd – to the extent it is rumored he has his D&D character’s name tattooed somewhere on his body – maybe all nerds are cool.

How about some neuroscientists? Everyone that is a fan of The Big Bang Theory knows that Mayim Bialik – once the irrepressible and inescapable Blossom – is a real-life neuroscientist who took a decade off from acting to get her Ph.D. Looking for someone more in tune with the young kids these days? What about Michele Boyd, who nerds know as Riley on the web series The Guild, but who kids may know as a new recurring cast member on iCarly. Boyd has a bachelor’s degree in neuroscience from University of California, Davis, and before deciding on acting, worked as a researcher at Harvard Medical School.

In the musical world, let’s get on that show Queen guitarist Brian May, who has his doctorate in astrophysics. Or Greg Graffin of Bad Religion, who has a masters degree in geology from UCLA and a Ph.D. in zoology from Cornell University.

Of course, the real people who need to be on that stage are the scientists themselves, who can tell their real stories about what science has done for them in their lives. If any girl watching that show were to listen to Jill Becker talk about how she tried to be a great mom while launching a tech-heavy startup company based on nanotechnology – lulling her baby to sleep with the sound of drilling as she hand-assembled her company’s first machines for sale – that girl couldn’t help but get inspired.

And I defy anyone – boy or girl, young or old – to not feel real inspiration in the story of Hugh Herr, an MIT researcher who lost both of his legs to frostbite while climbing Mount Washington. He went on to develop the most advanced robotic prosthetic lower legs available, and founded the company iWalk Inc. to bring those devices to the market. Herr should be on that stage with will.i.am and Kamen showing that nerds and scientists can be active and athletic, and won’t let anything stand in their way. That’s how you really Recognize and Inspire kids about science and technology.