Thursday, January 28, 2010

What is a Tutor/Mentor Program?

With so much emphasis on tutoring and mentoring, I wonder what the "mental picture" is in the minds of people who hear these words? I think that depending on where you live, how you were raised, what level of education your parents and neighbors have, you will see a different image in your mind when these words are said.

That makes if difficult to develop a national strategy that would make the "right kind" of tutor/mentor program available for the different circumstances that youth are dealing with in neighborhoods across America.

I created a short power point essay a few years ago, which I call Defining Terms. I encourage you to read it.



However, I also encourage you to look at the blogs I've listed below. Each one shows an activity that some of the teens at Cabrini Connections engage in each week. Each activity is led by different volunteers. Kids can participate in these for one or more years while they also have a separate one-on-one mentor/tutor who they meet with each week on either Wednesday or Thursday evening.

It's the combination of all of these activities, where everyone is focusing on helping kids go through school, college or vocational school, and into jobs and careers.

Art Club blog
Tech Club blog
Video Club blog
Writing Club blog
Profiles of students and volunteers.

This is all part of a strategy shown here on the Cabrini Connections web site.




Finding the money to pay the rent, salaries of our small staff of leaders who coordinate the work of more than 90 volunteers and 75 teens, is extremely difficult and constantly frustrating. Thus we need to be creative. This month we've launched Cabrini Madness, where teams of students, volunteers, staff and friends are each competing with each other to see which team can raise the most money by April first.

If you want to borrow ideas from what we do, to build or expand your own tutor/mentor program, please do. If you'd like to support us to help us keep helping the teens and alumni of Cabrini Connections, make a donation to support one of the Cabrini Madness teams, and encourage your friends to do the same.

2 comments:

TutoringServices said...

Hello Buddy I couldn't understand the tutormentor program. please explain it more. Online Tutoring

Tutor Mentor Connections said...

Often people who operate on-line tutoring services post comments, with links to their sites, as a part of their own efforts to attract comments. I usually delete these because this blog focuses on volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring in inner city neighborhoods, and the on-line services don't address the lack of internet access inner city kids have, nor the lack of mentors and coaches needed to help guide youth to the on-line sites, or pay the fees.

However, some of these on-line sites are well designed,and may be useful to students and families who can access them.

I would prefer, a direct comment from the people posting these, so we could discuss ways we might work together. Visit the www.tutormentorconnection.org site for more information that can be used to build site-based tutor/mentor programs. Visit http://www.cabriniconnections.net to learn about the program we lead in Chicago.