Alex Friedman, chief financial officer of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, visited Big Picture May 12 with colleague Casey Owens. Students Casey Morrison and Matt Marble interviewed the guests as they spoke to students and staff about the Foundation’s projects around the world and how they use math and quantitative reasoning in their work. In addition to overseeing finance and financial planning and analysis for the Foundation, Mr. Friedman is also responsible for assessing and improving the impact of the Foundation’s work. He confessed to not liking math in high school and stopped taking it after 10th grade, but stressed that it’s never too late to get good at something if you are passionate about it. Prior to working for the Foundation, Mr. Friedman was an investment banker in New York and served in the Clinton White House.

Big Picture students gather two mornings each week for a community meeting called PMU or Pick Me Up. Other notable guests this year have included Macarthur Prize winners Yoky Matsuoka and Colson Whitehead. Ms. Matsuoka was awarded the “genius grant” for her work combining neuroscience and robotics to develop a new prosthetic hand that moves like a human hand and responds to signals from the brain. Colson Whitehead, also a Macarthur Fellow, is a writer based in New York whose works include John Henry Days and The Intuitionist.

In photo: Gates Foundation CFO Alex Friedman (holding microphone) and colleague Casey Owens speak with the Big Picture community.