When will this end?

I watched a movie titled "The Six Triple Eight" this week on Netflix. It's a war drama film directed by Tyler Perry, focusing on the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, the only all-Black and all-female unit to serve overseas during World War II. They were given six months to fix the three-year backlog of undelivered mail in Europe and faced with massive discrimination, they managed to sort more than 17 million pieces of mail and get it delivered to troops. See more here. 

It's a powerful movie and several scenes brought tears to my eyes.  It also reminded me of how the discrimination these women faced did not end with their success in delivering the mail. It continued when they returned to the United States, from the late 1940s till now, entering 2025.

For the past 23 years I've been building a library of articles related to race, poverty, segregation and inequality in America.  

Browse this section and one of the first articles is this one from The Atlantic, asking "How Did We Get Here?" and sharing "163  years of The Atlantic's writing on race and racism in America."   This is one of more than 100 websites I point to in just this one section of the Tutor/Mentor library.

Another section focuses on Black History and also has dozens of links. Scroll to the bottom and you'll find the Zinn Education Project, with teaching materials that educators, parents and youth program leaders can use to expand our collective understanding of this tragic, continuing, history. 

I majored in history at Illinois Wesleyan from 1964 to 1968.  It wasn't until my senior year when I did my senior thesis on the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, which consisted of all African-American enlisted men commanded by white officers, that I was officially exposed to this history. And, it wasn't until I started volunteering with a tutor/mentor program in Chicago, serving elementary school kids from the Cabrini Green neighborhood, that I began to take a personal interest, that has grown over 50 years.

Another section of my library focuses on poverty and crime mapping.  One of the sites is the American Inequality site hosted by Jeremy Ney, with data maps and articles like the one shown below. 

You can also find many links in articles on the Mapping for Justice blog. For instance scroll these articles and you'll see how I've shared the American Inequality site. 

The maps are important. This Pew Research Center article provides facts about the U.S. Black population, which was an estimated 47.9 million in 2022.   Scroll down on this page to look at data about educational attainment and household income.  "Among Black U.S. households in 2022, 27% earned less than $25,000, 23% earned less than $50,000, while 51% made $50,000 or more. A third of Black households (34%) earned $75,000 or more, including 22% that made $100,000 or more."

The maps I share focus on that 27% who earn less than $25,000, and who are living in highly segregated, persistently poor areas of big cities and rural areas.  These are places where organized, on-going, volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs can expand the networks of opportunity for kids living in highly segregated poverty.

However, the color of your skin and racism affects people of all income levels.  Maps can help target resources and programs to areas of high poverty. They can also show incidents of police violence, traffic stops, drug arrests and other systemic practices that affect people of color more than others.  We need to understand and address both issues. 

Many of the sites I point to are libraries themselves, with links to hundreds of additional books, articles, movies, etc.  There's a lot to learn. Maybe too much to learn.  

Yet, without making the effort the racism and inequality that persists in America will continue. Will you add this to your 2025 commitments?

Thanks for reading my articles this year. I hope you're sharing them.

I can be reached on Bluesky, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.  See links on this page.

I depend on a small group of donors to help fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC and that enables me to keep the library on line and to keep writing articles like this.  If you can help, please visit this page.

Impact of 100+ years of segregation in USA

I've been building a learning library for over 40 years, intended to support my own efforts as a volunteer tutor/mentor, beginning in 1973, and the efforts of hundreds of students and volunteers in programs I led from 1975 to 2011.  When we created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1993 we systematically expanded the information being collected, and began sharing it with leaders, volunteers, donors who were part of organized tutor/mentor programs throughout Chicago.  In the late 1990s we began putting this on the Internet, sharing it with the world.

I created the graphic at the right more than 20 years ago to visualize the type of information I was collecting and sharing.  Since 2005 I've used concept maps, like this one, to show sections of the library. 

I've always focused on "why" tutor/mentor programs were needed, not just, how to be a good tutor or mentor, or how to organize an effective programs.  And, I've tried to inspire others to follow my own path, from volunteer, to leader, to advocate.  

Thus, one section of the library focuses on race, poverty, inequality, social justice, etc.  It includes several hundred links.  I added one more yesterday, after watching a webinar hosted by the Albert Shanker Institute, titled "Segregation and School Funding: How Housing Discrimination Reproduces Unequal Opportunity."

You can read the Executive Summary at this link, and find links to the full report, and case studies of seven cities featured in the report.

As I wrote above, I've been collecting links to websites that talk about segregation, inequality, racial justice, etc. for many years. Thus this is an old problem that has never been solved.  During the webinar the speakers introduced a section of the report, titled "The Evolution of the Segregation "Toolkit": 1900 - Present" that detailed tools that have been used for more than 120 years to create and maintain housing segregation in US cities. This starts on page 8 of the full report.

The authors write, "The discussion of this section takes the form of a narrative of sorts, one that unfolds over 120 years, in which individuals and institutions, public and private, display remarkable (albeit destructive and inhumane) agility and creativity in crafting new segregative strategies and adapting old approaches to rapidly changing circumstances. These efforts were so effective that the impact of policies and practices from a century ago are still evident today."

The graphic below was used to visualize the information in the "Toolkit".   

Note that while various laws were passed to end housing segregation, creative efforts were used to bypass those laws.  This is described in detail in the report.

Below I'm going to share a few Tweets that highlight some of the information in this report, including maps.  

Such criteria were used to exclude families of color from the federal loan insurance policies that fueled homeownership and suburbanization for 3+ decades. The grades often correspond with district racial composition and K-12 funding adequacy today, 80 years later. pic.twitter.com/9PHvYE4lwd

— Shanker Institute (@shankerinst) June 1, 2022

Here’s a map of covenants (red areas) along borders of Minneapolis, “protecting” these areas from non-white buyers for decades. @SchlFinance101 pic.twitter.com/o69Wp1G1Ei

— Shanker Institute (@shankerinst) June 1, 2022

In our seven metro areas (as nationally), we find substantial gaps in funding adequacy between white and Black and Hispanic students. @SchlFinance101 pic.twitter.com/kzysgrftSR

— Shanker Institute (@shankerinst) June 1, 2022

Bringing it together, districts serving majority Black/Hispanic students in our 7 metros are overwhelmingly likely to be funded below adequate levels and to score below the U.S. on tests. The same situation holds among all U.S. districts, and even if comp. measured relatively. pic.twitter.com/W4tQyQIc31

— Shanker Institute (@shankerinst) June 1, 2022

These are just a few Tweets posted by the Shanker Institute yesterday.  As I listened to the webinar, I tried to amply what was being said through my own Tweets.

#Violence in big cities can trace roots back to #segregation and inadequate school funding that stretches back at least 100 years.

If your school & state don't allow study of this information you can find the report at https://t.co/AWWSBMrthP https://t.co/nB0L0RU7wl

— Daniel Bassill (@tutormentorteam) June 1, 2022

I posted the Tweet below on Monday. The message applies to what you need to do to share the Shanker Institute report and motivate more people to read it and the other research in my library. 120 years of not solving this problem is far too long. 

Anyone can be the YOU in this graphic. Be a #NetworkBuilder. Connect people & ideas. Help solve #ComplexProblems. Get your university involved. https://t.co/WFMu9Fwu9F pic.twitter.com/fYJKLhubRn

— Daniel Bassill (@tutormentorteam) May 31, 2022

I've posted Tweets in many of my previous blog articles with the goal that you'll go to Twitter and follow these threads, then gather people you know to discuss what you're reading and ways you can get involved in solving some of the problems these Tweets point to. At minimum, you can seek out local youth tutor, mentor and learning  programs and offer them your on-going support. 

This photo shows myself addressing students and volunteers at one of our year-end celebrations. I did this every year for 35 consecutive years.  Every time, while I congratulated people for work done during the previous year, I encouraged them to dig deeper into the information in the library, to know more about where and why tutor/mentor programs were needed, and ways volunteers, and students, could take active roles in changing those conditions.

Around the country thousands of leaders are doing the same as myself, as they end programs for the current school year and begin planning for the next. Some are already actively recruiting volunteers for next year!

I hope you'll read the Shanker Institute report, especially the part about the "toolkit".  People have intentionally created the conditions that elevate White people and devalue people of color for over 120 years.  That won't stop until others are just as creative, and just as persistent, in efforts that counter those efforts. 

As you dig through the library, take a look at the articles about social capital that I've posted on this blog.  Expanding the "who you know" networks of kids and families living in segregated, high poverty areas, is one way to expand the network of those who need extra help achieving the American dream. 

Thanks for reading my posts.

I'm on Twitter @tutormentorteam and can be found on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.  Please connect and help me amplify these ideas. 

How will Chicago's Changing Demographics Affect Availability of Tutor/Mentor Programs?

The first round of 2020 census information has been released showing population gains and losses for every state. As more detailed census data is released later this year I expect a round of new maps.  Below is a graphic from a recent WBEZ article showing demographic changes in Chicago between 1970 and 2017.  I've added a 1995 map created by the Tutor/Mentor Connection, showing poverty areas and known non-school tutor/mentor programs. 

I led two different programs between 1975 and 2011. The first served 2nd to 6th grade kids and grew from 100 pairs of kids/volunteers in 1975 to 440 kids and 550 volunteers by spring 1992.  The second started in January 1993 with five 7th and 8th graders and seven volunteers. By 1998 it was enrolling about 80 7th to 12th grade teens and 100 volunteers a year and some of  these were beginning to graduate from high school and head to college. The size of the space after 1999 limited growth and we served that many teens each year until I left in mid 2011.

The first program was started in 1965 by a small group of Montgomery Ward headquarters volunteers. In 1975 when I became leader its enrollment was 100 pairs, with 90% coming from Wards.  By 1992 that had changed to 10% coming from Wards and 90 percent from more than 100 companies in the Chicago region. Some worked at the ATT location in Naperville.

The second program was much smaller, but it's volunteers came from many different companies. Some had roots with Montgomery Ward, but that company went out of business in 2000.

We created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1993 at the same time as we were creating the site-based Cabrini Connections program.  The T/MC's goal was to help programs like the one I'd led for 17 years grow in more places. To do that we began a survey to learn who was already operating, then a campaign to share information among programs, and to attract resources to programs, so the each could constantly improve, and hopefully converge toward the 'mentor-rich" model we had led.

We started plotting locations on maps.  The one shown here,  from 2019, shows the distribution of nearly 200 locations, which vary greatly in size, type of program, effectiveness, etc.  

One thing all of our maps show is that there are too few programs in the South part of the city and even fewer in the suburban areas where poverty has been growing.

In creating the library and the maps the goal always was that more people would dig deeper into the data and that more people would be gathering to make sense of it and use that knowledge in actions that helped support a growing number of constantly improving programs in more places.  I used this lecture hall photo to visualize that idea.

That's really not happening nearly as much as I hoped.  

So here are a few questions

a) how has Covid19 and virtual learning affected the ability of site based programs to attract kids and volunteers to a neighborhood-based location?; how will virtual learning and on-line connections enhance these programs?

b) will anyone pick up the work I was doing and create a database of programs that sorts by age-group served (elementary, middle school, high school, college, etc) and type of program (pure tutor, pure mentor, tutor/mentor, arts, STEM, etc)?  Until we do that we really won't have a decent idea of program availability. When you look at my 2019 map it looks like a lot of green icons. However, if you sorted for high school programs only, there would be far fewer.

c) how will the demographic changes affect the ability for site based programs to be distributed in all high poverty neighborhoods?  Will some locate near expressways and find ways to draw volunteers to their locations during the evening commute to and from work?  

d) if programs move to a primarily virtual strategy, will volunteers form strong bonds with the kids and the programs in ways that turn some into leaders who go back to their companies to recruit other volunteers and corporate donations?  

e) how many programs will sustain their connections to kids for five, ten or 15 years, helping them from first grade, through high school and into college? Too few programs have a long-term strategy like this now.  No one that I know is even doing the market-research to understand what programs do have such a strategy. 

I've never been able to get foundation leaders to spend time on my blogs, learning from my experiences and the ideas I share, or even asking me to be part of their conversations.  Instead I keep seeing things like this We Will Chicago initiative from The Chicago Community Trust and a network of other foundations.

A couple of years ago the Chicago Tribune launched a ChicagoForward Initiative, which I wrote about here.  In this and the We Will Chicago initiative people are invited to submit suggestions.  I have 40 years of suggestions that don't condense into a one or two page summary. Instead, I invite foundation and community leaders to use my blog and website and on-line library to do their own learning.  

Maybe they will ask and try to answer some of the questions I've been asking.

I'd be happy to coach the process.

Have you drawn attention to "Black History Month"?

This map shows segregation in the Chicago region and is part of an extensive article titled: "Segregation Map: America is more diverse than ever, but still segregated", in the May 2, 2018 Washington Post. I show the map and share a link to the article in this post on the MappingforJustice blog. 

February is Black History Month and millions are doing something to draw attention and to encourage study of Slavery and Black history in America.

If you've liked, reTweeted, or done anything to draw attention to Black History Month, I urge you to take time to read this article in The Atlantic, by Ta-Nehisi Coates. It's titled "The Case for Reparations" and reviews the long history of slavery, Jim Crow, separate but not equal, housing discrimination, etc. in America.  

Maps are a valuable tool for showing where people were most affected and where they need the most help.  You can find many map-based articles on this blog.   

In addition, I've been highlighting some of the stories and websites hosting them in articles on the MappingforJustice blog. As I've done this I've added updates to some articles as I find new information.  Here's an example, where I've added updates to this article on Redlining, which is a formal practice that forced Black Americans to live in highly segregated cities. 

I've been building a library of information, freely available to anyone, since 1993.  One section focuses on Black History and another on Poverty, Race and Inequality.   

As I've found new articles I began adding updates to the bottom of blog articles a few years ago.  I created this concept map to aggregate links to some of those and to help readers find the articles I'm hoping many will read.  

In a busy world full of social media too many people don't spend much time reading and thinking deeply about issues that affect them, their children and grandchildren, and their communities.  

I created the graphics below in the 1990s to visualize how a site-based tutor/mentor program can attract volunteers from diverse backgrounds, workplaces, colleges, etc.  As they connect with kids they become a form of bridging social capital, expanding the network of "who you know" that helps people find opportunities and overcome challenges.

However, these graphics also communicate another idea. Those people who become involved can share what they are learning and what they are reading with people in their family, work, college, religious and social networks, educating more people and getting more people involved in helping kids to careers by direct involvement in organized tutor/mentor programs or in working to remove the structural barriers that have built up over hundreds of years.

I've posted nearly 300 articles focused on "learning" on this blog. Most are not aimed at the type of learning students do in school. They focus on learning adults need to do to create a better world for themselves, their kids and grand kids, and for all others at the same time.  You can't read all these in a day, but you could visit many if it were part of an on-going process.  

Think of my blogs as "Sunday School for Future Leaders" where groups of people gather weekly, read some text, discuss it, then go live their lives, hopefully applying what they read.

If you're reading this. Make an effort to share it.  

I depend on contributions to help fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. Click here if you'd like to help. 

Stopping the Violence. Invest in the neighborhoods.

Today's front page story in the Chicago Tribune focused on the increasing use of rifles and assault weapons by gang members in Chicago. It's a terrifying escalation of a long-festering problem.

I've been following these stories for over 30 years, as some of the media stories shown at the left, illustrate.  If you open the "violence" tab on this site you can scroll back through 10 years of stories. In all of these I've proposed non-school tutor/mentor programs as a prevention strategy, not as a stop-the-shooting strategy.

If you're concerned about this problem, here's a web site that provides a running score on the shootings and homicides in Chicago. It's aptly named "Hey Jackass".

While homicides and shootings in Chicago were much higher in the 1980s and early 1990s, there have been a steady flow of shootings and deaths, every year for the past 35-40 years. The violence of the past few years actually distorts a reality that overall, crime is on the decline.

I started leading a non-school, volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning program in 1975 and continued to lead such programs through 2011. I've always advocated for a program model that drew volunteers from different backgrounds into the program, and into the lives of kids and neighborhoods.  This model depends on programs being able to sustain themselves for many years, so a youth joining in middle school years can stay involved through high school...or for six to eight consecutive years.

That's why much of my four-part strategy focuses on public education and drawing needed resources to programs.

What troubles me is that when a shooting takes place, I have difficulty offering tutor/mentor programs as a short term solution that would motivate a youth to leave a gang, or choose not to pick up a pistol, or rifle, and get in a car with the intent of going out and killing another person.

I created this graphic to illustrate what I propose as a long-term solution, with short term actions.

This arrow shows a timeline of birth to work, which stretches up to 25 or 30 years for some people.  When a shooting takes place, involving a young person between the age of 16-34 (with victims much younger and much older), the immediate response is triage. How do we get the guns off the street? How do we get kids out of gangs? Or how do we get gang members to stop shooting, wounding and killing each other? How do we heal the wounded, or counsel the relatives of the dead? How do we help kids focus on school and their future when they don't know if the next stray bullet will hit them?

That's the yellow highlighted portion of this timeline.

Dr. Gary Slutkin and CureViolence offer an answer with their program.

‘Interrupters’ help reduce violence in New York City https://t.co/uvNkBkezVl via @WSJ

— CureViolence (@CureViolence) October 2, 2017

A popular solution is the MyBrother's Keeper program supported by President Obama and Youth Guidance

We are the ones. Watch our new @MBK_Alliance video featuring President @BarackObama, @StephenCurry30, and @chancetherapper — then take action at https://t.co/YfrfTjqd5Z. #TheKeepersCode pic.twitter.com/LFCKfRi1A8

— The Obama Foundation (@ObamaFoundation) December 27, 2017

Earlier in 2017 I pointed to a WBEZ story about the cost of a jobs program targeting boys and men in high violence neighborhoods.  Read it here.

However, if we only invest in programs focusing on the people in the high risk pool, or in gangs and the justice system, we're going to be dealing with this problem many years from now, because we've not put in place a prevention strategy intended to reduce the number of young people who go into this risk group.

On the opposite end of my timeline are advocates for robust pre-school programs (highlighted in light grey).  Dr. James Heckman, a Nobel Prize winner in Economics, posted this Tweet, saying the "achievement gap starts at birth".

The achievement gap starts at birth. High-quality, zero-to-five education has the greatest impact on children, families and society as a whole. https://t.co/mxZn1kxJ2B pic.twitter.com/dyF0YkTNRS

— Prof. James Heckman (@heckmanequation) December 27, 2017

Voices For Illinois Kids has been an advocate for early childhood programs since the 1990s.  I encourage you to dig through their web site to find ideas and resources. Look at the data offered in the KidsCount data book, published annually.

If we build strong pre-school programs and strong re-entry and opportunity youth programs, we've addressed both ends of this problem, but still need to address the support kids in high poverty and distressed situations need from first grade through high school, post high school and into adult jobs and careers.

In the hub-spoke graphic I posted above, I describe a strategy where a youth program, or a school, are places where kids connect with adults, experiences and support systems that extend far beyond what they normally see in their family or neighborhood. This strategy presentation (PDF) visualizes that idea and shows the role of business and professional groups to help make such learning opportunities available in every high poverty neighborhood.

In the Tutor/Mentor web library you can find links to dozens of different types of youth serving organizations. Each could provide ideas that might be duplicated in other places. You just need to spend time looking at these sites.

I've been writing stories like this for more than 20 years, but too few people are reading and responding. Thus, I'll end with another tweet, where a young Chicago women is calling on adults to provide the resources kids need to grow up safely and become part of the American dream.

My name is Eva, & I'm a 19 year old from the South Side of Chicago. I recently did a TED talk describing what we REALLY need to stop Chicago's gun violence problem: resources. I'm trying to help my people get free, & I'd appreciate if you share my story: https://t.co/Fv7WNPNWl4 pic.twitter.com/LrF9jawVc1

— eva maria 🌹 (@imyagirleva) December 28, 2017

I hope you'll take some time over the next few weeks to open the links, view the videos, and then share this and other articles I write with people in your own networks, in Chicago, and in other cities throughout the world.

Note that in the graphic I posted above I included a map showing poverty in Chicago. Here's a different version. Youth support systems need to be fully available in every one of these neighborhoods. You can't have some pieces on the North site, some on the West side, few on the South Side, etc. and expect the system to deliver the outcomes you want.

It will take the consistent, long-term involvement of people from many sectors to build and sustain this system and make it available in every high poverty neighborhood of every city and state in America....as well as in other countries.

Ideally, people would have started building this system 25 years ago. The next best time to start is NOW.

12-11-18 update - gun violence in Philadelphia - web site.  The ideas I share can be used in any city, because every city has some of the same problems

12-11-18 update - gun violence articles on MappingforJustice blog

11-3-2026 update - A new index examines the widening gaps in opportunity, wealth, and social connection within America’s cities—and why those divides can hold entire metros back.  Read Seth Kaplan's article at https://flourishingneighborhoods.substack.com/p/the-neighborhood-divide-holding-cities 


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