Learning from others. Don't re-invent the wheel.

 I saw this Tweet from an organization called "Education Reimagined" and was drawn to the statement “Hey, they look like our community. Maybe we can do this, too.”

"We have discovered a remarkable variety of learner-centered models that allow communities everywhere to say, “Hey, they look like our community. Maybe we can do this, too.”" https://t.co/DGl80I1gnF #edchat #suptchat

— Education Reimagined (@EdReimagined) April 6, 2021

I visited the article and the headline read, "Whatever community you are in, you are bound to find something parallel and worth digging into." I looked through the site and found a page with an interactive map, with six categories exploring different elements of learner-centered education. 

This group was formed in 2018.  It models what I've been trying to do since forming the Tutor/Mentor Connection in Chicago in 1993.  Look at the mission statement shown on our home page.

The mission of the Tutor/Mentor Institute (T/MI) is to gather and organize all that is known about successful non-school tutoring/mentoring programs and apply that knowledge to expand the availability and enhance the effectiveness of these services to children throughout the Chicago region. 

 THIS IS A MARKETING PLAN INTENDED TO MAKE HIGH QUALITY, CONSTANTLY IMPROVING NON-SCHOOL TUTOR/MENTOR PROGRAMS AVAILABLE TO THOUSANDS OF YOUTH LIVING IN HIGH POVERTY NEIGHBORHOODS OF THE US AND THE WORLD

Then, look at the STRATEGY page. 

Since 1993 the Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC), which I now lead through the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC, has been collecting and sharing information in an extensive web library that went on line in 1998. It's goal has been to provide information anyone starting or operating a non-school, youth tutor, mentor and learning program could use to begin a program and/or constantly improve an existing program.

I created the presentation shown below about 10 years ago to explain the role of this library in stimulating innovation and constant improvement across the entire ecosystem of organizations working with youth. 

Using Ideas to Stimulate Co... by Daniel F. Bassill

Below is a concept map showing the entire web library. Visit this blog article and find links to each sub section. While some of what I share comes from my own experiences of leading a youth tutor/mentor program for 36 years, most points to the ideas and experiences of others. 

Click on any of the featured nodes and you'll open another map, focusing on that area. Open nodes on those maps and you'll go to a section of the web library with relevant links.

This part of the library includes the list of Chicago area non-school volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs that has been the central focus of the library.  It also contains links to other resources that anyone can use to learn what others are doing and find ways to improve their own programs.

I plotted this information on a map based program locator between 2004 and 2010, but that is now only an archive.  

Since 2016 I've been sharing my list on this map, which you can zoom into for more neighborhood level detail.  See it in this article. 

There are numerous challenges to what I've been trying to do.  Obviously, the first is to find the money each year to collect the program information and web site library links, then to maintain a website and interactive map to share the information.  While I succeeded for nearly 20 years I've not been able to do as much since 2011.  I'm trying to find an institution who will take ownership and rebuild the web platform to be of equal quality to those like  the "Education Reimagined" site.

However, that's not the only challenge.  On the STRATEGY page that I pointed to above I showed a concept map visualizing four concurrent strategies that I've followed since 1993.  Below is the same map, but with each of the four categories I show some of the challenges that need to be addressed. 

One of the major challenges, not shown on this map, is generating a flow of talent and dollars to EVERY youth program within a geographic area like Chicago, so each can do more to tell what they do,  how they do it, and how others can help them,  on their own web sites.  Along with this would be money for staff, and motivation for them to be constantly looking at other web sites to compare what they do, with what others do.  

A further challenge is to motivate donors to be looking at the same information, in the same conversations, so that when a program says "we should be doing this" a donor says "I'll provide the money."  Wouldn't t hat be great!

The library  has little value if too few people are using it.

My last blog post, on April 1, was focused on information collection and sharing and I highlighted a few groups who were collecting education information, seeking to 'reimagine learning'.  I think there would be a value for someone to be aggregating links to all of these groups, so they could be learning from each other, attracting more attention, and building the public will needed to make solutions available in every place needed, especially the high poverty areas of the USA and the world.

The concept map below shows an example of what's possible.  These are Chicago based intermediary organizations that focus on the well-being of youth.  They share the same geography, but few share links to each other on their websites, or host a concept map similar to this.

I find the same in some of the education innovation groups I follow.  More should follow the advice of  Education Reimagined:

“Hey, they look like our community. Maybe we can do this, too.”

However, someone needs to be aggregating and sharing this information.  Who is doing this?