Understanding Issues

Last Sunday I posted an article showing a new page on the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC website, where I'm hosting visual essays that I've created since the late 1990s and updated often since then.  

I've added two more pages since then. Page 2 is shown below. 

Visitors can find these if they look at the list of topics on the left side of the website.  The visual essays are shown at the bottom of the first set of topics, below the link to the concept map page and the T/MI Theater page.

The topics in the first section are intended to support a progression of thinking that leads to more and better volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs reaching youth in high poverty areas.  Thus, at the top of the list is "Understanding Issues"

When you first look at this list, you'll only see "Understanding Issues and Benefits" which is shown in orange in the above graphic.  When you click on that link a page will open with several sub-topics.  

However, if you look at the side bar, you'll see that there are sub-topics listed. These include a PDF essay titled "Defining Terms" and "Strategy Visualizations by Interns".

When you open the page you'll see work done by interns between 2006 and 2015 to interpret Tutor/Mentor strategies and share them via videos, animations, blog articles and visual essays.  And, on the left side, you'll see three sub topics, showing two more pages of visualizations plus a page of videos created by interns.

There's a lot of information here, and I'm concerned that much of it is hidden by the way sub-topics are presented on the side bar.  

All of this is part of Step 1 in the four-part strategy map shown below.  It's a constant effort to keep this information updated and to add new links to the library on a regular basis.

Getting people to look at this information is an even greater challenge. I've never had advertising dollars or support of high profile celebrities thus too few people even know this resource exists. Thus, if you share it with people you know, you're helping do the work of Step 2.

However, Step 3 is equally important.  We need to find ways to help people learn what's in the library.

We need to help people learn to use that information to support the growth of existing youth tutor/mentor programs and to create new programs where more are needed, by borrowing ideas from existing programs, not by constantly starting from a limited knowledge base.

That's why the work interns did was so important. They were helping other people learn what was in the library and on my websites.  It's why I keep urging readers to help find universities who will create a Tutor/Mentor Connection curriculum and grow new leaders of individual programs, and of intermediaries who collect and share information and help draw attention and resources to all of the programs operating within specific geographic regions like Chicago.

I hope you'll help.

Thanks for reading this. You can connect with me on many social media platforms. You can find links on this page.


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