A cure for diabetes? Everything is possible with This includes collaborating with the Governor in the community, the Foundation is a true first cluster. He saw the potential of this initial
the Foundation’s support, if the benefit to the on the Lean Initiative designed to help asset to the state of Rhode Island. cluster and began to grow his “Computing for
community as a whole is evident. In 2017, government operate at the speed of business. the Innovation Fellowship will focus on one By implementing Lean business processes challenge for Rhode Island: increasing and throughout state government, the program improving civic engagement. helps foster innovation and creative problem
“The Innovation Fellowship provides the
support for an individual to move forward
with a great idea,” said Malin. “It is used by
recipients who are developing solutions that
are beneficial to the state and help to foster
civic engagement.”
solving by state employees. The initiative is
already producing positive results including
less waste and a culture of continuous
improvement. Additionally, the Rhode Island
Foundation is one of the organizations
partnering with the Governor’s office to
help bring 13 Rhode Island cities and towns
“back to life” through participation in the
a Cure” project quickly from there.
— 2017 Putting Idle Computers to Work
Computing for a Cure All West Warwick Public School students
Austin Laramee, a West Warwick High School
sophomore, read in an email that the state’s
tech director was getting rid of 1,200 older,
unused XP computers. An idea was sparked,
and he began researching ways to recycle and
repurpose outdated technology by putting
unused computing power to work for a
good cause.
receive a Google Chromebook for use during
the school year. Over the summer, they
typically go into storage until the new school
year begins. In the summer of 2016, Laramee
instead put the high school’s unused
Chromebooks to work and assembled a larger
grid computing network. The Folding@home
software was downloaded from Stanford, and
Alignment with Broader Goals Federal Reserve Bank of Boston’s Working While it may seem the Rhode Island Foundation Cities Challenge, designed to foster cross- Laramee came across Stanford University’s began participating in a network computing
burst onto the scene with the “Make It Happen” sector collaboration to pursue initiatives Folding@home project, which encourages grid, processing protein folding and simulating
event, the organization has been supporting that better communities. people to donate unused computing power to cellular reactions.
help scientists who are studying some of the
workforce development for years. More
than that, the Foundation also works
in partnership with other leading
Enabling Positive Transformation
most critical diseases — including Alzheimer’s,
Huntington’s, Parkinson’s, and many cancers —
the computers from West Warwick High School
This August, Computing for a Cure had
309 computers connected and processing
thousands of files each day to assist with this
In the first half of 2016, the Rhode Island by simply running a piece of software on their Foundation distributed $18.2 million in computers. These researchers are attempting grants to fund nonprofit programs serving to understand the mysteries of protein The way that Folding@home works is that
Rhode Islanders. Dozens of nonprofits received folding, which requires massive calculations once the software is downloaded, Stanford
funding through the Foundation’s competitive to be solved. The donated computing power University sends connected computers a
strategy grant program that targets seven key is used to help form the world’s largest folding problem to solve. This problem is
sectors: arts and culture, children and families, distributed supercomputer to crunch the essentially a large file that contains
education, economic security, the environment, numbers needed to help solve those complex anonymized genetic data of hundreds or
health and housing. Hundreds of nonprofits calculations. The “Folding@home” software thousands of patients, which is then processed
received discretionary grants, awarded by simulates a process called protein folding by by the connected computers and returned to
the Foundation’s staff and directors to breaking down computational problems into Stanford. The computers scan and analyze
organizations and programs that strive small “work units” and passing them on to genes/genetic strings from normal patients
The Rhode Island Foundation also played a for long-term solutions to significant individual computers to solve. and cancer patients to pinpoint differences
central role in integrating the workforce community issues.
organizations, like the Brookings Institute,
to facilitate groundbreaking studies that
analyze Rhode Island’s greatest opportunities
for innovation and growth. For example, in
the fall and winter of 2015–2016, the
Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings
worked in association with Battelle Technology
Partnership Practice (now TEConomy Partners,
LLC) and Monitor Deloitte to advance a new
competitive strategy for the state of
Rhode Island.
development goals of Governor Gina Raimondo
and its objectives for strengthening the state’s
advanced industries and improving growth.
42
|
2019 eCURRENT
Laramee initially obtained permission from
With its commitment to supporting Rhode his school to use some of the XP computers
Island ventures and its deep financial support that the state was due to get rid of, and built his
critical, life-saving research.
between healthy genes and cancer genes.
Those differences are then sent back to
scientists for further evaluation of the data –
e.g. is the difference something that needs
Stronger Together
|
43