Tutor/Mentor Video Collection

Teens, volunteers and interns have been creating videos to tell the tutor/mentor story, and Tutor/Mentor Connection strategies, since the early 1990s. These can be found on YouTube and Vimeo, but not in a single location. Click here to see videos created in the past three years, then click on my subscriptions to find three other channels on YouTube with videos created in past years when I was leading Cabrini Connections. You'll even find a video created by Sara Caldwell in 1990, when we were with the Montgomery Ward/Cabrini-Green Tutoring Program.

Today I was looking for some past videos and found this one, where I talk of some of the reasons I've been involved with tutor/mentor programs since 1973. It's one of many you can find here on Vimeo.

To see even more videos, from past conferences and/or interviews I've done, click here.

The stories from the past tell the same message as the one I'm telling now. Volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs, if they are well organized, involve a wide range of volunteers from different backgrounds, and are consistently funded, can have a long-term impact on youth and volunteers, as well as leaders such as myself.

Chicago Election. Long Term Results

This is the back page of an 8 page newsletter that I picked up while attending the 1997 Presidents' Summit for America's Future event in Philadelphia. I was a Chicago delegate, and my organization, the Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC), was one of 50 Teaching Examples with booths at the Summit.

I was hoping this event would launch a wave of reinforcements (talent, dollars, ideas, etc.) to support site based tutor/mentor programs in Chicago and other cities, as well as intermediaries like the T/MC who were collecting and sharing information, and organizing events, intended to draw these resources directly to tutor/mentor programs.

I tried to find this organization on the web site, but it no longer exists, at least under this web address. The organization supporting this effort is TeenInk.com, which you can find here.

As you can see from this graphic, which is the front cover of the 1995 Chicago Tutor/Mentor Programs Directory that the T/MC compiled, I've been collecting information about Chicago tutor/mentor programs since before 1995, and have been using maps to show where existing programs are located as well as where more are needed, for just as long.



Chicago is electing a new Mayor this week, and new aldermen in many Wards. I've shared my strategies for using maps with many, for many years, but have yet to see any consistent use of maps to draw attention and resources to places in Chicago, or its suburbs, where indicators show a need for extra support for youth and families.

Furthermore, since I started using maps in 1994, I've yet to see a President, Mayor, national leadership groups like America's Promise, etc. use maps consistently and for the purpose of drawing resources to places already operating, so each could constantly improve.

I've been sharing ideas showing a planning process that I'm sure leaders in business and the military use (to some extent), that focuses on "everything" that needs to be done to fight and win a war. This involves far more than putting combat troops in places of conflict. It involves building supply chains, recruiting and training programs, and educating the public so it has the will to support a long term effort. This PDF is one of many I share in my web library. It's free and has been available for many years.

Planning Cycle - War on Poverty by Daniel F. Bassill

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If you're a leader, or get elected this week to be a leader in Chicago, I encourage you to use maps in this way. If you lead a youth serving organization, or youth publication, encourage your teens and volunteers to create stories using maps, and calling on resource providers to fill high poverty areas with needed volunteer-based tutoring, mentoring and learning programs, as well as the talent, dollars and technology each program needs to operate, and constantly improve.

Here's the front cover of the publication that I point to above.

Five Presidents were featured and pledged to help the most at risk kids in America get mentors and find safe places to learn, play and connect during non school hours. Too bad none of them, or Presidents elected since then, have done this consistently, nor used maps in their own efforts to mobilize resources to support youth serving organizations.

By the way, I'm looking for partners, sponsors, volunteers and a wide range of help to update my own mapping platform and to support the Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences that I host every six months in Chicago. Click here to make a sponsor contribution that supports my efforts.

Case for Business Investment in Mentoring

David Shapiro, CEO of Mentor, has made a strong case for business investment in mentoring programs, in this Huffington Post article. I created the concept map below to point to recommended reading that would strengthen business commitment to investing in volunteer based tutoring, mentoring and learning programs. I point to many places of potential involvement in the Chicago Program Links section of my web library. This concept map, and several others, is part of a series of blog articles I wrote from late October through early February.

David encourages businesses to support involvement of their volunteers. I offer some suggestions for how to do that in this ROLE of Leaders PDF. This is one of a collection of illustrated PDFs that I've created to show ways to support the growth of volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring and learning programs in more places where they are needed. Below is one that focuses on engaging employee talent, not as direct tutors/mentors, but as people who build the organizational strength needed by every tutor/mentor programs to support volunteer and youth involvement.

Recruiting Talent Volunteers for Youth Tutoring, Mentoring, Learning Programs by Daniel F. Bassill

If you are doing business in Chicago our within 150 miles I encourage you to take a role in the Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences that I've hosted every six months since May 1994. The next is Friday, May 8. Organize a workshop to show how you engage employee volunteers and support places where they volunteer. Invite other businesses to attend and share their own strategies. While you may compete in the workplace, and for employees, share what you learn to help more youth in America benefit from participation in well-organized tutoring, mentoring and learning programs. Use this form to present a workshop. Use this form to become a financial supporter.

Tutor/Mentor Learning Path now on YouTube

Last week Wona Chang, the 2015 Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC intern from IIT and South Korea, created a Prezi visualization that guides visitors through the various information on the T/MI web sites. Yesterday she created a video version, which you can see below. Good work, Wona!

Navigation of Tutor/Mentor Institute web site

Wona Chang, the T/MI's 2015 intern from IIT and South Korea, created a visualization using Prezi to guide visitors through the different sections of the www.tutormentorexchange.net web site. There's an English language version and a Korean language version.  Unfortunately the Prezi versions are no longer available.

After creating the presentation on Prezi, Wona created a YouTube video to show it. You can see that below:



This is one of two visualizations Wona did during the internship. As she was doing this she was learning new ways to communicate ideas. She told me, "I've never used Prezi before, or converted a Prezi to  YouTube".  That's one of the befits of working on these presentations the way interns have in the past.

One of the best ways to learn something is to spend time diagramming and writing about what you are learning. Creating leaders who are prepared to deal with the complexity of poverty, and of building and sustaining resources and programs to overcome poverty, requires leaders who have habits of deeper learning and are willing to make the sacrifices of time and effort to build their knowledge base.

This is a practice that students and adults could duplicate.