FLEX TIME f oc u s on tec h no l og y
By Courtney Kennedy
H
e’s innately creative. He’s a go-getter. And he credits his time at Brunswick for preparing him for hard work.
Alexei Bulazel ’10, a rising senior at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, N.Y., has a passion for computer science. The techie received RPI’s 2012 Founder’s Award of Excellence, established to recognize students who embody creativity, discovery, leadership and the values of pride and responsibility. The honor addresses academic and extracurricular achievement at large and is awarded to a mere one percent of the student body.
s e r u t n Adve in the s s e l r e Teth ld Wor
Although Alexei boasts a near-perfect GPA, omnipresence on the Dean’s List, and membership in Upsilon Pi Epsilon and Gamma Nu Eta, international and national honor societies, respectively, it’s his passion for extracurricular work that stands out. Alexei is part of the Tetherless World Research lab on RPI’s campus. His work, overseen by the technology’s inventor, Jim Hendler, involves “semantic web” technology, a way of structuring During his months on the Hill, he advised Rep.
information online to make it — and the links between various pieces of information — recognizable and manageable by computers. Earlier this year, Alexei delivered a talk to the Tetherless World lab during a lecture series
“Mr. Gupta had an enormous influence on my interest in computer science. He always let me do cool stuff and was a true mentor.”
Kelly on technology issues and authored opening statements for him on the subjects of cyber-warfare, cyber-security, and federal IT policy. Alexei made such a positive impression that in December 2011,
given to members of the staff — the first time an
after returning to school, he prepared a briefing
undergraduate had ever addressed the group.
on a controversial technology-related bill at Rep.
Alexei became interested in computers in Middle School, spending two summers in high
collaboration with RPI’s Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC).
Kelly’s personal request. During the summer of 2012, Alexei once again focused his attention on government, interning
school in Brunwick’s IT lab as the right-hand man for
In his participation with WRPI, he had the
Sunil Gupta, Director of Technology and Computer
opportunity to work with RPI Professor Pauline
for Data.gov, a U.S. government website created
Science Department Chair in the Upper School.
Oliveros, a renowned composer and central figure
to facilitate the distribution of government
“Mr. Gupta had an enormous influence on my
in the development of electronic art music. Alexei
information to citizens. “At Data.gov I created an ‘instance hub’ site
interest in computer science,” Alexei said. “He
took her graduate-level arts course, focused on
always let me do cool stuff and was a true mentor.”
the intersection of telepresence technologies and
that presents information about U.S. federal
experimental composition and improvisation.
agencies reporting data to Data.gov in a computer-
Summers have provided Bulazel with an
understandable semantic format,” he explained.
It was at Brunswick that Alexei says he really learned to think outside the box. He credits Seth Potter, Upper School Theater
opportunity to stretch his imagination and worldly
“The instance hub allows web developers using data
and English teacher, for “influencing [me] to do
experience even more. This summer, he has worked
from Data.gov to more easily relate information
creative and artistic things.”
on a senior capstone research project on how
about the agencies that created the data.”
At RPI, Alexei has found a creative outlet through his involvement with WRPI, Rensselaer College’s radio station, for which he’s coordinated
malware can avoid detection by anti-virus software. In the summer of 2011, Alexei interned at the Capitol for U.S. Congressman Mike Kelly (R-Penn.).
Post-graduation, Alexei plans to pursue an MS in Computer Science at Rensselaer, followed by a PhD in the same subject.
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