Jefferson Award for Public Service - 32 years later

On February 11 I was honored to be featured in this article on the blog of the Jefferson Awards for Public Service page.

I received this award in 1982, when it was the Chicago SunTimes Jefferson Award. You can see the newspaper story from then at this link.

I've received other awards since then, such as in 1999 when I received the Publisher's Clearing House Good as Gold Award on the Dec. 31 telecast of the Montel Jones TV show.

The best rewards for the work I've done have come from students and volunteers testimonials of how much a difference the programs I've led have had in their lives, or how much help the Tutor/Mentor Connection has offered to their own program-building efforts. I met my wife through the program at Montgomery Ward thus my two kids are also one of the unexpected rewards of doing this work.

I've never gotten rich. In fact, I've never earned as much since 1990 as I was earning in my last year with the advertising department at Montgomery Ward. However, I have a wealth of experience that I try to share via this blog and the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC web site. And a vast network of people who I've met and learned from, just as they have learned from me.

I've been putting as much of my ideas as I can on these web sites. I've also been working with interns to help create new interpretations of these ideas. Visit this site and see new work added every six months by interns from IIT and South Korea, and from other universities. Visit this page to see more work done by interns.

Thanks to everyone who has helped me do this work and thanks to those like the Jefferson Awards for Public Service who help us share our story with thousands of others.