Brett Sherwood

I am living in Houston, Texas, where I was born and raised. I just recently graduated from Arizona State University with my bachelor’s in Interdisciplinary Studies with concentrations in Psychology and Organizational Leadership. My time in the analytics department (doing both data analysis and as a department manager) was largely impactful for me. I learned systematic organizational skills, leadership as a form of advocacy, and more about problem-solving as a team. I accepted the leadership position at NSTEM both to continue my personal growth through integration of what I learned across my degree in a professional environment, but also to be able to help cultivate and give the meaningful experience I had as an intern to others. It is a central belief of mine that one of my responsibilities wherever I go is to make things better for those who come after me.

The skills that I value most in this type of position are my strong sense of empathy, and capacity to understand others’ perspectives as well as my understanding of servant leadership. I want to cultivate the growth of others, and help them achieve their personal goals. I also have a fascination with analytics, specifically how you can use it to identify meaning out of data collections that may feel meaningless at first glance. With STEM, my experience lies mostly on the technology side, as I grew up on computers, and was a Software Engineering major before I changed to what I graduated with. Programming I find very fun, but I didn’t enjoy as much the engineering side of the degree.

Overall, what NSTEM has meant to me has been a chance to quantify what impact I’d like my work to have in my life, and I want my time here as a leader to help give others that same opportunity in their journeys.