Repeat after me! Try it!

I've been digitizing 30 years of files from the Cabrini Connections tutor/mentor program and the Tutor/Mentor Connection, which I and six other volunteers created in November 1992, and launched in January 1993.  

Since this was a two-part strategy I created two versions of the print newsletters we sent from 1993 to 2003. One focused on our own Kids' Connection tutor/mentor program, serving teens in the Cabrini-Green area of Chicago. We called that NEWSLINK.  The other focused on what we were doing to help all programs grow, including our own. We called that T/MC REPORT.

As I've digitized these I once again was reminded of my on-going effort to recruit others to deliver the exact same messages, through their own newsletters and media. 

Below are some pages from a few issues of the NEWSLINK newsletter.  You can click on the image to enlarge and read the text.  Or you can open the link and look at the entire issue, including the page I'm sharing.

Winter 1996 NEWSLINK - open PDF

In the "President's Message" I wrote, "Chicago won't change the bleak prospects for these children, and Chicago's future, unless it provides a comprehensive range of "birth-to-work" programs that reaches ALL of these kids --- in school, and after school --- and in every neighborhood, not just Cabrini-Green."

The rest of the information on this page shows the "1995 Kids' Connection action plan". 

Spring 1997 NEWSLINK - open PDF

I wrote this in the months before the 1997 Presidents' Summit for America's Future, which drew leaders from every state and was chaired by five living Presidents of the United States.  

In it I wrote, "Wouldn't it be  nice if all of these companies making pledges would look at a list of programs already operating in the communities where they do business, devoting just a percent of their new commitments to programs already operating.  Not just the big well-known programs, but the programs that are grass-roots efforts, operating in churches, social service centers, at business sites and libraries.  Think of how important these helping hands could be to the success of students we are already working with."

The rest of this page has messages from high school seniors who had been with our tutor/mentor program since it was launched in January 1993.  I'm still connected to them via social media.

Jan-Feb 1998 NEWSLINK - open PDF

The heading was "DUPLICATE WHAT WORKS".  The subhead was "What will it take for youth groups in every neighborhood to look like the Quantum Opportunities Program (QOP)? How can businesses, foundations and communities help?

Open the PDF and read the suggestions I offered, then read more about the Kids Connection program. See the page with notes about alumni. See how we include information about the Tutor/Mentor Connection. 

Feb - Mar 1999 NEWSLINK - open PDF

Under the two maps I wrote "No general has ever won a war without a good map, and better "intelligence" than his opponent.  Yet in America's effort to help at-risk kids move from poverty to careers, few leaders are using this powerful tool."  

Open the PDF and read about Kids' Connection activities, our 3rd Annual Film Festival,  use of technology, and more.  

Feb - Mar 2001 NEWSLINK - open PDF

I've included two pages from this issue. The first is the back page of the newsletter, with a heading of "Where there is suffering, there is duty." This was followed by "With these words, President George W. Bush launched his leadership of this great country.  Over the next four years we'll learn if these were just good sound bites, or if there is a sound strategy and commitment behind them."

Then I wrote, "We cannot wait to find out. We each have a leadership role to play."

The second page continues this article and on the bottom page uses a network-building graphic that I've used over and over in past newsletters.   Above the graphic I wrote, "OUR GOAL is to recruit leaders who will use their own "bully pulpit" to focus on-going attention to tutoring, mentoring and school-to-work learning programs in every poverty neighborhood and to Internet-based information models which these programs can, and should, use to constantly improve the outcome of their work.

In the rest of this issue you can read about the Kids' Connection first annual reunion, our Black History exploration, the annual video festival and more.  

Read more 1993-2001 issues of NEWSLINK - open this folder.  Then open this folder and see copies o the T/MC REPORT newsletters.  As you look at these remember, the funding was raised by the people who were also raising funds to operate our single Kids' Connection tutor/mentor program. 

In most of my newsletters I've encouraged others to read and share my messages.  I want to dig a little deeper into this.

First, these show ideas I was sharing more than 20 years ago!  If you read past blog article you'll see I'm still sharing them. 

Second, very few people actually received these newsletters. In 1993 our distribution was 400 people. By 2001 it was about 12,000.  That's still just a whisper in a crowded city.  That means if you are reading this now, you're seeing information that is "NEW TO YOU".

If you share the messages in the newsletters, it will be NEW TO YOUR NETWORK AND COMMUNITY!

I want you to create your own blog, podcast, videos, PDF presentations, newsletters and websites where you literally repost my articles, with your own introduction and call-to-action.

If you're a former student you could start by saying, "I'm (name). I was part of the tutor/mentor program from (years). It made a big difference in my life. That's why I'm going to be sharing these messages.

Then use the text from what ever article you're looking at and post it in your blog, podcast, video, etc. with links to the www.tutormentorexchange.net website and blog. 

If enough people do this, over-and-over, for the next 20 years, there will be more programs helping kids through school and into lives free of poverty, in Chicago, and in other parts of the USA and the world, AND MORE VOLUNTEERS AND DONORS REACHING OUT TO HELP THOSE PROGRAMS. If someone aggregates links to these stories, the collection will serve as inspiration for even more people to do the same.

Imagine a concept map like the one below, with links in each node to people who are sharing stories like this - open map

This shows key talents needed to build a tutor/mentor program. If people from these professions are sharing stories, they are recruiting people like themselves to get involved.  A version of this could be created for every city in the world!  Doing so would be one step closer to getting these people to connect, share ideas, and work to reach more people and help more kids. 

Doing this over-and-over is the essential commitment. In advertising we understand that it takes multiple impressions just to get a potential customer's attention. Then even more, to motivate him/her to consider buying our offer.  

To help kids from first grade through high school a program needs to be able to stay in business for 12 years!  No program starts great. They grow to be great, over a period of years, and with a constant investment of ideas, talent and operating dollars.

Instead of this being dependent on one person, it will be the vision of many.  Furthermore, over time you will no longer need to repost my articles. You will be creating your own!

Read the "a New T/MC' articles to learn more about my search for new leaders to re-energize the Tutor/Mentor Connection and help versions of it grow in every city with pockets of persistent poverty.

Thanks for reading.  Please connect with me on social media (see links here).  

If you're able, consider a contribution to help me pay the bills. Visit this page. 

Honor those who gave their lives

Next Monday America will honor those who gave the ultimate sacrifice in service to this country.  Open the "Memorial Day" tag on this blog, you'll find many stories I've posted in the past. I hope you'll read some of them. 

My message has continually been "Remembering the sacrifices of those who have given their lives, bodies, spirits and loved ones to this country can best be done by making daily commitments to actions that reduce poverty, strife, inequality, conflict and destruction of Mother Earth and other forms of life."

At the right is a graphic that I've used to focus on doing the research and planning that gets us from "here", or where we are now, to "there", or where we want to be in the future.   Find it in this article.

As you look at this, I encourage you to read this article about "Project 2025" which is the playbook Republican strategists have in place to reshape America if they win the Presidency in 2024.   Even if they lose in the November 2024 election, ultra conservative groups will continue to push this agenda.

Is that what our men and women in the Armed Forces gave their lives for?  

Amidst all the parades, picnics, ballgames and family celebrations, find time to do some reading and reflection.  While I hope this leads some to support strategies I've shared since 1993 to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs reach K-12 kids in every high poverty neighborhood of America, I hope all will learn more about the threats to the kids I focus on, and to women and girls, and to the basic freedom to worship however we choose, within a pluralistic democracy. 

Thanks for reading. Please share my articles in your networks and follow me on social media networks (see my links here). 

If you can help me pay the bills, please look for information on this page. 

What's your personal learning network (PLN) look like in 2024?

Over the past 15 years I've written many articles about personal learning networks (PLN) and about social network analysis, or mapping networks. Below is a graphic from one of those articles.

In that article I wrote, "We all have networks. Most of us don't spend time segmenting our network into family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, etc. then look for ways to tell them "I'm involved", yet if more people did that on a regular basis, more people would be giving time, talent and dollars to support youth tutor, mentor and learning programs and that might reduce the number who get involved with gangs and end up on the wrong end of a gun."

In another article I used the concept map shown below.

I created this concept in the mid 2000s to visualize my goal of helping students and volunteers, at the tutor/mentor program I led in Chicago,  build personal learning habits, drawing information from the Internet, and the wealth of people you can meet there if you spend time looking. 

I started connecting with others using the Internet and e-Mail list serves in the 1990s.  Below is part of a message I posted in 2000 on a Digital Divide list. 

You can read this in my archives - at this link.  It was exciting back then to be connecting and sharing ideas with people throughout the USA and the world.  It's motivated my on-line efforts for the past 25 years.  

I began using Twitter (now X) in the late 2000s and my use has grown since then.  Thus, the change in ownership and policies over the past couple of years has really been discouraging.  

Last week I read an article written by some of my CLMOOC education friends who I first met on Twitter in 2013, titled "Lines of Flight: The Digital Fragmentating of Educational Networks".   For some of you who have been connecting with myself and others on Twitter, this article will be valuable.  

For many others, who have never posted anything on Twitter, or who may have stopped using it more than three years ago, this may not matter to you.

For me, the Internet has been an essential tool to share ideas and try to motivate leaders to take on strategic roles that make volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs available to more K-12 youth in more high poverty areas of Chicago and other places with persistent poverty. 

I created the graphic shown above in 2011. It's intended to show how an idea spreads as your network expands.  The longer you work at this, the farther your reach will be.  I'm still just a speck in the ocean of ideas, which is why I keep asking readers to share my blog articles.

If you're interested in network building and network analysis, dig into the articles on this page. 

Why is this important?  A couple of weeks ago I posted an article using the graphic shown below.

Our world faces a tsunami of challenges.

Many of the issues on this graphic are directly related to what we do to help youth in high poverty areas via organized, volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs.  Other issues are challenges the kids we mentor, our volunteers, and everyone else in the world, are facing now, and will continue to face for the next century.

I've built a web library over the past 30 years to aggregate information people can use to better understand problems, to see how people in other places might be solving those problems, and to find ways to work together to develop local and global solutions.

This concept map shows the role of information in an on-going planning process. 

While much of this work needs to be done at the one-on-one and small group level, the problems are too big and in too many places, for small groups to have much of an impact.

You, we, ME, all need to be connected in one or more on-line platforms and constantly learning from libraries like mine, and each other.  

I've moved from AOL Digital Divide, to Mott Afterschool Lists to  Yahoo Groups, G+, Ning.com, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and other platforms over the past 30 years.  If you open the PDF that I referred to at the top of this article you can see some examples of early efforts to map my network and show who I was connected to.   You can read more about network analysis in this series of articles. 

I don't know what's going to happen with Twitter. I still use it, and encourage others to connect and share ideas there, and in other spaces.  I don't find many who are mapping their networks.  It's something that youth in tutor/mentor programs might learn to do, with help from volunteers. 

If you know of people who are doing this, share that with me in the comment box, or, on social media!

I received a call last week from Leo Hall, who was in 4th grade in 1973 when we first met.  He's celebrating his 60th birthday this year and wanted me to send a video, since he knows that I am not traveling any longer.  I wrote this article in 2014 after attending his 50th birthday.  This article includes a message Leo sent me in 2006.

Also last week, I received a wonderful message on Facebook from a student from the 1990s who ended her message saying, "the rides you gave me, the scholarship to high school, the trips to different places may have been small gestures to you but they meant so much more to me."  

She was living on the West side of Chicago, after moving from the Cabrini-Green area. Our program was located at the Montgomery Ward Corporate office in the Near North part of Chicago.  So, for two to three years I gave her and her siblings a ride home after weekly tutoring sessions, as I headed to my home in Park Ridge.  We had many interesting conversations.  

My own experiences and feedback from former students keep motivating me to reach out and connect with others because I can't do all the work that needs to be done, or have the impact that's needed, for the country to do all it needs to do to help  kids in high poverty areas move through school and into jobs and lives free of poverty, and racism, and bigotry, and all the other problems we, and they, will be facing.

I hope you'll connect with me on social media, or take time to visit articles on my blog and website and then share them with people in your own network.  Small daily actions can make a big difference.

Thanks for reading.  

If you're able to help me pay the bills, please visit this page. 

7-7-2024 update - Mapping changes in network over time - Kumu.io blog article - https://blog.kumu.io/mapping-changes-over-time-in-kumu-14c015554dbf

Drawing Attention & Resources to Chicago Tutor, Mentor and Learning Programs

 In 1993 when we did the planning that launched the Tutor/Mentor Connection in Chicago in January 1994, one goal was to "increase frequency of stories about tutoring/mentoring programs in order to build awareness for the tutor/mentor movement, individual organizations, and the need for such programs".

We launched a survey in January 1994 and published our list of programs in a printed Directory in May 1994.  

We put the list of programs on the Internet in the late 1990s and since then I've done all I could do to help each one get the attention, dollars, volunteers and ideas they need to operate and constantly improve.

Yesterday I posted an article encouraging programs to use social media to gather ideas and to share their own stories.  Today I'm going to share some images that I gathered over the past few weeks, which were posted by various tutor/mentor programs.

Polished Pebbles - view website.  Read article posted by Kelly Fair, founder of Polished Pebbles. 

Lawyers Lend-A-Hand to Youth - view website

Chicago Lights - view website

Youth Opportunity United - view website

Chicago Youth Programs - view website 

Midtown-Metro Achievement Centers - view website 

Chicago Scholars - view website 

Diamond in the Rough Youth Development Program, Inc. - view website 

Highsight Chicago - view website 

College Bound Opportunities - view website 

Tutoring Chicago - view website 

Daniel Murphy Scholarship Foundation - view website 

Project OneTen - view website

I'm sure there are a few others who have been posting regularly on social media, such as Big Brothers Big Sisters Chicago and Learning Edge Tutoring. 

I pointed to some of these in this article, from last September.  And, in this article, from October 2020.  And, in this article from 2019.

I point to my lists of programs, and to other sites with directories and lists of Chicago youth-serving organizations, in this article.

On the home page of www.tutormentorexchange.net you can find lists of Chicago programs posting on Facebook, Twitter (X), and Instagram. 

Do you see a pattern here?

If I can write articles that share images and website addresses for youth programs in Chicago, so can anyone else.  If you're in another city, write articles about programs in your own city.  

Thanks for reading and (hopefully) sharing this article.

Find me on many social media platforms (find links on this page). If you're writing articles like this, share them with me so I can share them with others.

Finally, if you can help me pay the bills, visit this page and send a contribution.  

Who's scouting social media for new ideas?

Today on my Twitter (x) feed (yes, I still  use it), I saw two posts that I'm sharing below.

Millions Girls Moonshot - click here

This post asks, "Have you explored our #Moonshot Toolkit?  Check out our collection of resources.

The second post was from Henry Mintzberg, author of  21 books about management and strategy.  He pointed to the article shown below. 

In the article he talks about a "grassroots model of strategy formation".  In point #2 he writes "These strategies can take root in all kinds of strange places, virtually wherever people have the capacity to learn and the resources to support that capacity".   

In my 50 years of involvement with volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs I've applied an on-going process of "information gathering", learning from others strategies that I might apply in my own efforts. 

In 1993 when we created the Tutor/Mentor Connection we formalized the learning into an on-going process which I've continued for the past 30 years. As I've found new information I've added some of it to the Tutor/Mentor web library, so it becomes immediately available to anyone else who is looking for similar information.

I have spent time almost daily on the Internet since the late 1990s, learning from others, sharing what I've learned, and encouraging people to connect in efforts that draw needed resources to all of the youth serving organization in Chicago, not just the most visible.  

In the past decade Twitter has been one of my primary resources.  Thus, I was able to see the posts from the Million Girls Moonshot and from Henry Mintzberg today.

Having led a tutor/mentor program with limited resources I realize how little time staff members have to spend in on-line learning.  Yet, I find this so valuable that I've made time for it myself and encourage others to do the same.

If you don't have the time, perhaps a volunteer, student or other member of your organization can serve as your "scout". They can monitor feeds from myself and others on different platforms, then share what they see with others in your organization.

Make the time. Or recruit others.  It's one of the basic strategies you can apply for constantly improving the work  you do to help others.

You can find me on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Mastodon and other platforms. See links on this page. 

 

10-Year Wish List from 2015 - Not Yet Achieved

In November 2015 I attended a brainstorming session aimed at generating ideas for where the Illinois Mentoring Partnership would be in 10 years. After that meeting I posted my own list of what I hoped would be a reality by 2025.     

Here's what I wrote:

----- begin 2015 post -----

I'm 68 now so don't know if I'll even be alive in 10 years. Thus, I don't have a self-interest in what happens, just a life mission that some of these ideas do come into reality.

Here's my list:

1) I hope that a map of cities like Chicago will show that every poverty neighborhood has several organizations offering volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring and learning in the non-school hours.

2) I hope that more than 75% of the leaders, volunteers, donors, alumni and current students in organized non-school tutor/mentor programs are connected to each other in on-line, on-going learning and collaboration portals. I've pointed to the potential of cMOOCs. Who knows what this will look like in 10 years.

3) I hope that concept maps, like the one below, will be commonly used, like blueprints, to show all of the different supports kids and families in high poverty areas need over a 20-25 year period so kids have the opportunities to succeed in school and move into adult jobs and careers free of poverty.

4) A minimum of 5-10% of funding for tutor/mentor programs and intermediaries will be coming annually from unsolicited donors who have visited a program web site to shop and choose who to support, and how much they will give.

5) Funding of youth serving organizations, and other social benefit organizations, will be based on what the organization does, not on their tax status.

6) A minimum of 50-60% of all funding will be for general operations and for building and sustaining strong organizations and leadership teams.

7) Data maps will be consistently used by programs, donors, policy makers, etc. to a) understand where programs are most needed; b) understand the various types of programs needed in each zip code; c) understand the availability of needed programs in each high poverty zip code, sorted by age group served and type of program; and d) understand the distribution of Federal, state, city and private funds into each high poverty zip code.

8)Concept maps, like this, will be used to show involvement and commitment of leaders from every sector of a community, including business, professional, religious, educational, entertainment, political, etc.

9) Students in middle school, high school and colleges all over the country will be part of on-going groups who are learning to use data to understand problems and potential solutions, and are learning habits of leadership, visual communications, collaboration, innovation, volunteering and giving that support the flexible operations of constantly improving social benefit organizations in all places where data-maps show they are most needed.

10) One or more universities will host a Tutor/Mentor Institute, archiving the ideas I've collected and shared for past 25 years, and teaching students to be leaders and/or proactive supporters and leaders who take responsibility for making the first nine ideas on this list a reality in the cites where the university is located, or in the cities where their students come from.

In 15 or 20 years I hope the maps of Chicago and other cities show fewer high poverty neighborhoods as a result of the strategies and long-term vision adopted by leaders who read my articles and who I meet with on a regular basis.

I think that it will take leadership from many organizations to bring this list to reality. But that leadership should be evident by reading blog articles and reviewing web sites of those who are taking leadership roles.

What do you think? What would your list look like?

---- end 2015 article ----

Well, it's almost 10 years later. I'm still alive. Still sharing these ideas.  In fact, I've been sharing this vision for over 30 years.  But, too few have ever heard me, or read this blog.  That's why I keep sharing past articles on social media.  I want people to spread this information so more people see it and take ownership.

Here's just a few other past articles.

I used this graphic in this 2018 article titled "Building non-school support systems for kids in poverty".  As with many of my articles this focuses on building teams of people with various talents who will do the learning and on-going innovation that is needed to build and sustain constantly improving youth serving programs in every high poverty area of Chicago and other places. 

I used this graphic in this 2017 article, titled "What Do We Need to Do to Achieve This?"    That's the "big question" that teams need to be constantly asking. 

That graphic is also included in this article, titled "Creating Economic Justice - Opportunity for All."

In many of these articles I've shared a vision of having universities create on-campus Tutor/Mentor Connection-type programs that duplicate what I've been doing for the past 30 years and systematically prepare new leaders to operate the thousands of youth-serving programs needed throughout the country, and to provide the talent and dollars each of these programs need on a consistent basis, for many years. 

Here's one article where I shared that vision.   

Note: Since I formed the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC in 2011 to try to keep the Tutor/Mentor Connection alive in Chicago and share it in other cities, I've used the two names interchangeably.  Thus, when I say build a "Tutor/Mentor Institute" on a college campus, I mean the same as when I say create Tutor/Mentor Connection-type programs.".

I hope that who ever takes ownership of my work in the next few years will figure out how to reduce this confusion.  

Thanks for reading this, and for sharing it.

I'm on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon and other social media sites. I hope you'll follow me and introduce me to your network.  You can find links on this page. 

I'm also continuing to ask for your help, and contributions, to help fund this work. Visit this page and use the PayPal if you can help. 

Local-Global Thinking - Competing for Attention

In my last article I included a link to a January 2005 newsletter's President's Message, shown below.

In that article I wrote, "I feel that if we can create a portal that tells why it's important to help kids, with doors leading to each continent, each nation, each city, and each neighborhood where kids need help, this portal can serve as a funnel for dollars, volunteers and similar resources to go to individual programs in each neighborhood. While there are some on-line charity portals, like http://www.networkforgood.org, these promote all forms of charity, and thus don't have the passion and appeal that could be generated by having portals that focus on specific channels of service, like tutoring/mentoring."

Without addressing the funding issue, we'll never reach the levels of learning and shared effort needed.

In 2019 I wrote an article using the "Can't drain the swamp" graphic that I'd created in 2012.  I'm sharing it below.

----- begin 2019 article ---- 

Can't drain swamp?

A few years ago I wrote this article talking about "I can't drain the swamp because I'm up to my neck in alligators".  I was talking about how leaders of other tutor/mentor programs were not able to join me in trying to solve problems we all face, such as consistent funding, when we were struggling to solve each of those problems in our own programs every day.

Today I saw a graphic on Facebook that made me think of this.  I've posted that graphic below, with some additions that expand on the original.

Climate change and nuclear war represent threats and challenges above all others.

In the original graphic issues like healthcare, immigration, guns, justice, etc. were shown as concerns of people living in different places. While these are important, they are overwhelmed by the looming threat of climate change disasters.   In the blue call-outs I've added some other issues, and at the top right I've inserted a graphic showing the threat of nuclear war, or nuclear terrorism.

What are all the things
that we need to do?

For the past 25 years I've spent time almost every day calling attention to the challenges kids living in high poverty face and the roles that organized volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs can play in helping them overcome those challenges as they move through school and into adult lives.

I point to a list of Chicago programs where people can volunteer time, talent and dollars and to a web library where anyone can learn more about the issues and ways to get involved.

Chicago Sun Times 1996

I have done this while there has been a constant flow of stories like the one at the left, showing the agony of violence in Chicago, and asking "When will this end?"  The story at the right was from the 1990s, so we still have not found an answer to that question.

I don't believe any single, short-term, action of a tutor/mentor program can make street violence stop, or make poverty suddenly disappear.  However, I do believe that the continuous on-going support of volunteers and staff in well organized programs can help kids who are part of those programs move more safely through school and into lives beyond the immediate grasps of violence that primarily affects high poverty neighborhoods.

12-20 years of support

I've used graphics like the one at the right to emphasize the need for providing long-term, birth-to-work support to kids in every high poverty neighborhood.  While this is not easy it's work that needs to be done.

However, it's not the only work that needs to be done.

Below are two concept maps from my collection showing this same graphic, but also showing the many different issues kids and families living in high poverty areas face every day. Some of these are the same as those shown in the Facebook graphic at the top of this article.

Many are problems people who don't live in poverty also are facing. 

Here's one version

Reasons to engage - local global - click here

Here's another version

Open map at this link  View in this article

Each of these issues are important and need passionate people focusing on them every day. Yet we need to budget our time to also focus on the bigger threats of climate change and nuclear war/terrorism which by themselves can cause extinction of the human race and make all of the other issues irrelevant.

George C. Marshall

What I've been describing is a wicked, complex problem.  We need leaders who can visualize the entire problem and mobilize people and resources to work on the individual pieces, in step with everyone else, and for many years.

One of my heroes is George C. Marshall, who led US forces in World War II.  Without the power of today's computers he created a multi-year strategy that fought opponents in almost every part of the world.

Today I see some of this comprehensive thinking among those leading the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals. 

Follow the links in this article and you'll see some ways they are drawing attention to all of the work that needs to be done to achieve the SDG goals.

follow links - cmap

So how do you get involved?

I've created a "civic engagement" cmap with links to parts of my web library with information readers can use to dig deeper into all of these issues.  In addition, at the top of the map I have links to web sites aggregating information about 2020 Presidential candidates (this has been updated for 2024 elections).  I encourage you to look through their web sites to see if you can find any who think like George C Marshall and who visualize their thinking in ways the rest of us can understand.

Then, pick a cause, and get more informed and personally involved.

8-11-2020 update - since I wrote this post the world has become an even more dangerous place. We now face a world wide pandemic, with a much greater level of illness in the United States. We are reeling from an epidemic of police violence.  The climate crisis continues to grow. We also face a growing threat of how "big data" in the wrong hands can further concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a few.   I've updated my graphic to reflect this. 

12-22/2021 update - since I last updated this graphic Covid19 has continued to spread and the January 6th attack on the US Capital, and lack of prosecution of instigators, causes even greater concern for the future. I updated my graphic to add new fears about the future of democracy in the United States.

---- end 2019 article ---

Since creating the last update of this graphic in 2021 new challenges have emerged, ranging from the war in the Ukraine to the tragic conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Gaza and the Middle East.  Compounding this is the use of disinformation to spread chaos and destabilize the US and other democracies.  The emergence of Artificial Intelligence makes these even more complex.

I posted the map of the world's ongoing conflicts in this 2023 article on the Mapping for Justice blog.   

You can see that there are plenty of places competing for our attention and our dollars.

How did I grow from spending two hours a week as a volunteer tutor/mentor in 1973, to leading a single tutor/mentor program, to trying to help similar programs grow in all high poverty areas of cities like Chicago? 

Take a look at two more graphics.

This shows that while I was creating a new tutor/mentor program in late 1992 I also began creating a strategy to help similar  programs grow in all high poverty areas of Chicago.  This was the result of networking with Chicago program leaders since 1975 when I first starting leading the program at Montgomery Ward's corporate headquarters. 

If you read my past blog articles, and newsletters in my archives, you'll see a constant learning and brainstorming process, centered on "How can I do this better?"

This graphic illustrates how thinking about a single program, and a city full of great programs, leads to thinking about many other problems facing Chicago and the world.

My January 2005 newsletter talked about connecting leaders from many places. This concept map visualized that idea.

Thanks for reading this article. I know it's a lot to think about, and the links take you deeper and deeper into my library.  Because of the time involved I keep searching for universities who will add my library and archives into an on-going learning program, that reaches below the university level, to K-12 schools, then extends beyond college, to life-long learning.

If that were happening some day you'd find web pages on university websites that share versions of my graphics, maps and concept maps, updated and improved, by student learners.  Maybe you'd even find portals like I described in my 2005 newsletter.

If you find sites where people are doing a good job of visualizing the problems we face along with solution paths, please share the links in the comment section or on Twitter where you can find me @tutormentorteam.  You can find me on other social media sites, too. Visit this page to find links.

I've been ending my articles with a request for financial support of Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. Click here if you'd like to help.