Stop the Violence around Crane. Is Police State Mentality the Answer?

Today and yesterday the Chicago SunTimes featured two-page stories in response to the shooting of one student near Crane High School, and the severe beatings of two others. You can read 3/17 here and 3/18 here.

These stories focus on the immediate response of setting up police escorts to get kids from one public housing area to the school, because the kids fear retaliation from kids who come from the neighborhood of the youth who was killed. That's a good show of force by our new Police chief. But it's not enough.

Last week an article in the SunTimes focused on the new book chosen by the Mayor and the Public Library that everyone in Chicago is hoped will read. Why couldn't the choice have been the articles in the Tutor/Mentor Connection web library? Maybe if more people read these we can begin to get more people involved in solving the problems that plague our inner city neighborhoods.

I'm sure the stories about Crane High School are selling newspapers. But, why aren't the editorial and education writers doing stories about how kids who fear for their lives aren't going to be focusing on learning and how this affects the future of Chicago's economy because we're leaving too many kids behind who we need to fill positions in the 21st century workforce?

Why aren't we asking John, Hillary, and Barack what they are doing to engage people in this type of complex problem solving?

Over the weekend I browsed a publication in my library, titled "Wanted: Solutions for America. What We Know Works. An overview of research about what works (and what doesn't) in social service programs." This was published by the Pew Partnership for Civic Change in 2003 (2023 note: The specific link is no longer available. Look at the "solutions" reports in this 2008 web archive).

In the conclusion the article reads "Equipped with reliable information about what works, how do communities move forward to tackle tough problems? If so much is known about promising approaches, why haven't we come farther faster in connecting all citizens to hope and opportunity."

As the authors of this report conclude, "Change doesn't just happen. It demands gifted and persistent leadership." There are no short term answers to this. Putting an army of police around this school won't solve this problem. It's a band aid. And it won't address the same problem in the area around many other big city public schools.



In many of my blog articles I use maps to illustrate the wide geographic areas where poverty is concentrated in Chicago, and where there are poor schools, gangs and youth on youth violence. I use graphics and concept maps to illustrate what the Pew Partnership was referring to when they said "We have focused too narrowly on specific interventions without confronting the complex interrelationship of issues in a community."

In this concept map of the Tutor/Mentor Connection library I illustrate the four components of the T/MC library, in an effort to draw together people from different silos, and in an effort to expand the thinking and problem solving ability of people who focus too narrowly on just one part of this problem.

Why mentoring? Because mentoring is an adult form of service learning. It can engage adults who don't live in poverty directly in the lives of youth who do. If we can support the growth of hundreds of volunteer based programs around the city we can grow the number of adults who begin to understand this problem, and begin to use their time, talent, networks and wealth to contribute to solutions.

I host a May and November conference with a goal of drawing people who read or write these articles and host these web sites, into face to face networking, and to create public awareness that draws more people to the Internet where they can read these articles and connect with others.

If you're in health care, law, higher education, engineering, workforce development, or if you're a leader, or volunteer, or donor who support tutoring/mentoring programs, I encourage you to use the conference as a meeting place (not offered since 2015) and the T/MC library as a resource for complex problem solving.

If you're the new head of the Chicago Police Department, I encourage you to look at the T/MC as your own strategy. There's no way you can keep an army of police around every high school in Chicago, throughout every school year.

The SunTimes articles show that the problems of gangs have plagued Chicago schools for 20 years and more. It's almost taken for granted. Why?

Student Song Calls for Change Following School Shooting.

Dana Mackey, a former staffer and volunteer with Cabrini Connections, who works at Phoenix Military Academy in Chicago, sent me this message:

"Check out a few of my students from Phoenix Military Academy on the news!!! David Woulard is such an amazing kid. He wrote this song this past weekend after a Crane HS student was shot and killed 2 blocks from my school.

I asked David the other day after school in the computer lab if he knew any Keane songs and he said, "Is Everybody's Changing ok Ms. Mackey?". He played the whole song and nearly had me in tears. That song is one of my favorites and I didn't think he'd actually know it. If any of you out there have any contacts in the music world, let me know!!

Check out this website to read the ABC 7 Chicago story and listen to his song... "

I hope you'll all take a look.

New Map Gallery

I encourage you to visit the Tutor/Mentor Connection Map Gallery which has been completely rebuilt by Jim Cory, a volunteer based in Madison, Wisconsin, who I met several years ago in an internet discussion hosted by the World Bank.

Jim's long-term involvement illustrates the way volunteers can use their talent to help non profits with important work. It also illustrates that volunteers don't need to be in your own neighborhood, to help.

We'll be updating all of the maps in the Map Gallery and adding new maps, thanks to work being done in our office by Mike Traken, a GIS intern. You can follow Mike's progress on the http://mappingforjustice.blogspot.com blog.

Read previous articles on maps and leadership to see how we hope these maps are used to build a better distribution of high quality tutor/mentor programs in all poverty neighborhoods of big cities like Chicago.

Blog Exchanges as part of Marketing Strategy

In Chicago we're mourning the killing of another student. People are calling for gun control laws (which I support) and I've heard some say they will put up a $5,000 reward to catch anyone who kills a youth in the future.

I wish the city leaders would spend some time looking at the availability of non-school tutoring, mentoring, learning, enrichment and jobs programs in the 60612 zip code where Crane High School is located (which is where the most recent shooting took place). Then develop a T/MC type strategy aimed at helping the existing programs constantly improve, while helping new programs form in under served areas.

On the Program Locator section of the T/MC site, I only see three organizations offering any kind of tutoring and/or mentoring during the non-school hours to teens in this zip code. If there are more, we don't have these programs in our database.

One of the challenges we face, as a small non profit organization, is reaching out to all of the organizations in the Chicago region who do any type of volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring to teach them to list their organizations in the Program Locator, and to keep the information current. Another problem is finding the talent and technology support to keep our web services working and easy to access.



However, the biggest challenge is a lack of advertising dollars to reach out daily to all of the people who want to see schools improve, poverty reduced, violence end, and youth more prepared for jobs and careers. This map illustrates the many different interest groups who need to be connected to this community-wide problem.

Without advertising and public relations dollars, too few people find the information we maintain in the Tutor/Mentor Library, or the directory of tutor/mentor programs we host. Thus, we're innovating new ways to build public awareness, and this is by blog exchanges. Click here, here and here to see three places where tutoring/mentoring is the subject of bloggers around the country.

If you'd like to connect with us, in this blog exchange strategy, we'd like to hear from you. It's one way we can increase public attention for all of us.

Tutoring and Mentoring: Making a World of Difference for A Child

Guest Blog, By Judge Michael B. Hyman, Circuit Court of Cook County

Tutors or mentors can make a powerful difference in a child’s life. They prepare children to reach beyond immediate circumstances. They push children to transcend societal and personal limitations. And assure children that somebody besides those in their household cares for their welfare. The results, as anyone who has done it knows, can change lives, both the child’s and the tutor’s or mentor’s.

Public school classes are too large for a teacher to interact with children individually. Parents or guardians may not have the time, the expertise or the patience necessary to affect or supplement a student’s progress. This explains why tutors and mentors are so vital – tutors and mentors provide undivided attention that can bring about academic or athletic or social growth in a young person, which might otherwise be unattainable or neglected. Tutoring and mentoring positively affirms a child’s feelings of self-worth so they develop as individuals and as human beings, and more effectively achieve their full potential as learners.

I started participating in a tutoring program during my junior year of high school. Every other week, for 90 minutes, I met with a sixth grader from an impoverished area of Philadelphia. The children were brought by bus to my suburban school. I vividly recall the first child I tutored, Matthew. He could barely read, even simple words were difficult for him, and Matthew’s struggle to read affected his self-esteem.

I remember how much he wanted to learn, and how much I wanted him to succeed. Matthew didn’t have someone at home to help him, but he had something else – desire, and as the weeks turned to months, his ability to read slowly, slowly improved. And so did his confidence. By May, although he was still behind many of his peers, the gap had indeed narrowed. In recognition of his progress, I gave Matthew a couple of books about sports to read over the summer. His ear-to-ear smile has never faded from my memory.

Decades later, I am still involved in tutoring and mentoring as a member of board of Lawyers Lend-A-Hand to Youth, a project originally created by the Chicago Bar Association and now an independent not-for-profit organization. Lend-A-Hand to Youth provides guidance, encouragement and support to mentoring and tutoring groups who serve young people in at-risk local communities. We also recruit lawyers to volunteer as tutors and mentors, recognize outstanding programs and participants, and award grants to exceptional programs. We lend more than a hand; we restore hope, and opportunity to economically disadvantaged youth across the Chicago area.

In at-risk communities, parents do what they can for their children but must deal with their own personal quandaries. Tutors and mentors offer a gleam of light for a better future. While tutoring and mentoring cannot erase poverty, crime, or violence, or put an end to neglect, abuse, or irresponsible parenting, it can make a world of difference for a child. To paraphrase the anthropologist Margaret Mead, never doubt that thoughtful, committed tutoring or mentoring can change the world of a child. Indeed, it always has.

I am sure that Matthew would agree!

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Thank you Judge Hyman and Lawyers Lend A Hand Program for supporting volunteer based tutoring/mentoring in Chicagoland.

Dan Bassill is a guest blogger today in The College Puzzle blog.

Frameworks for Systemic Transformations of Student and Learning Supports

I'd like to encourage you to review a white paper I received this week from the UCLA Center for Mental Health in Schools, titled "Frameworks for Systemic Transformation of Student and Learning Supports"

In the preface the authors write "if school improvement efforts are to be effective in enabling all students to have equal opportunity to succeed at school, we all must move significantly beyond prevailing thinking. Current policy (NCLB) and practice is a grossly inadequate response to the many complex factors that interfere with positive development, learning,and teaching."

Basically they say that "teaching to the test and the federal No Child Left Behind" strategy is a flawed policy because it does not give equal weight to the social emotional and extra learning needs of children, especially those in high poverty areas.

I agree. I wonder what our presidential candidates think about this.

The UCLA group is in the process of building a community of people who are interested in their work, and who begin to use it to support their own actions in many cities and states. With enough support communities around the country might begin to implement these ideas, and public policy, and funding, might support such a strategy.

Building such support is a difficult process. I'm not sure it can be achieved without expanding the base to include workforce development goals of businesses, hospitals and universities.

The UCLA plan is a school-centered strategy, with a community based component. I approach this challenge from a child and community centered perspective, where the school is one of the stakeholders, but not the automatic leader. The child is the center of this universe and we're all part of the "village" of people working to help that child to a career.

I feel that volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring is a way to expand the range of people involved in helping kids grow up. If workplace volunteers are targeted, this is also a way to build business involvement in education goals.

The May and November conference, and the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site, offer meeting places, and a library of ideas, for anyone who wants to expand their knowledge and become more strategic in how they use their time, talent and/or dollars to help inner city kids succeed in school, and in life.

I hope that you'll read the UCLA paper and add the T/MC ideas to this strategy and that you'll connect with us in one of these forums.

Share A Meal on March 11. Make a Difference.

Making a difference is a simple as lifting a fork. On Tuesday, March 11, 2008, restaurants across Illinois join with generous dinners to raise money for non profits in the 5th Annual Share-A-Meal with Community Shares of Illinois. Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection is a member of Community Shares (under the Tutor/Mentor Connection name). So you can enjoy a great meal, have fun with friends, and help us raise money for the work we all do.

Each restaurant will donate 20 to 30% of the proceeds of each meal purchased on March 11, and this support over 80 non profits in Illinois. Please visit http://www.share-a-meal.org to see the list of participating restaurants and non profit members of Community Shares of Illinois.

Just Why do Students Drop Out?

I encourage you to read this article based on research being done by a group at Arizona State University.

The research shows that the decision to drop out of school is a long-term process, starting as early as first grade.

This means solutions need to be much more comprehensive than what we're doing now. It also illustrates the importance of a comprehensive volunteer-based tutor/mentor strategy.

Drop Out Crisis a Public Health Issue

Last September I posted an article titled "Reframing School Drop Out as a Public Health Issue.

While the SunTimes has called for action by CPS, I hope you'll all read this and encourage hospitals, universities and business groups to take strategic roles in keeping kids in school, and preparing them for jobs and careers.

I encourage you to read some of the blog articles on the Smart Communities blog, which illustrate reasons for business and hospitals to become strategically involved.

My goal for the May and November Tutor/Mentor Conference is to have leaders from these industries host 70 minute discussions, sharing what they do, and building visibility for pro-active strategies that mentor kids to careers. If you can organize such a workshop, or host a panel, submit a workshop presenter form as soon as you can so we can begin promoting your involvement.

Dropout Crisis at CPS demands quick action

The feature editorial in today's Chicago SunTimes shows that Chicago Public Schools had a staggering 44% drop out rate and that the rate for Black males was even higher, at 57%. Apparently CPS held a "drop out summit" this week to develop solutions to this problem.

I have two comments. 1) about time; 2) why weren't we invited.

I've written about the Drop Out crisis in previous articles such as here and here so I don't know why this is suddenly a "news" for the SunTimes. It's been a crisis for a long time.

Read some of the drop out crisis articles on the T/MC site and you can learn a lot about this crisis.

And volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring has been a solution for a long time. It's just that the leaders at CPS, and in the Mayor's office, or the media, don't promote this as a solution with the same daily consistency as telephone and finance companies bombard us with ads for their products.

What we have here is a marketing problem. We need leaders who will consistently advocate for volunteer involvement in non profits helping kids connect with tutors/mentors, sports, technology and a variety of other learning and mentoring solutions. And these don't need to be managed or operated by Chicago Public Schools.

We have a window of opportunity. In early February a CEO Summit on Volunteerism was held in New York City, with a goal of unleashing $1 billion in pro bono business talent to support non profit organizations. Jim Morsch of the Lawyers Lend A Hand Program attended the Summit. His observations are posted here.

Wouldn't it be great if a share of this were devoted to building and sustaining a full range of non-school, and school-based tutor/mentor programs who all were focused on helping kids move through school, advanced learning or vocational education, and into jobs and careers!!

In May I'll be hosting the 29th Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference since May 1994. I'm looking for speakers who can talk about the drop out crisis, and who can talk about ways that mentoring can be one part of the solution. I'm also looking for speakers who can show businesses how to be strategically involved in tutoring/mentoring, either in building capacity, or in building business programs that engage volunteers and support the growth of programs that serve their workforce development goals.

Visit the conference web site to find details and submit a workshop proposal, or email tutormentor2@earthlink.net with your ideas.

What Keeps You Up at Night?

I've been participating in a discussion on the Social Edge site, which asks what keeps social entrepreneurs awake at night.

We all have personal challenges that cause sleepless nights. However, people who run businesses, or non profits like Cabrini Connections and Tutor/Mentor Connection, have additional challenges.

Such as how do we pay the rent, the payroll, or "how do we make a difference in the world". In a tutor/mentor program these challenges are how do we attract and keep key staff and talented volunteers, and how do we inspire kids as young as 4th and 5th grade to take more responsibility for their lives and their futures.

Social Edge is one of many on-line forums where I network, learn, share ideas, and find volunteers to help in the work I do.

In the Links Library on the T/MC site, I've more than 1400 links, pointing to forums like Social Edge, or other web sites where someone is working to help connect kids and adult volunteers, or where someone has information that might help others understand why and where tutor/mentor programs are needed, or why business, hospitals and universities should be strategically involved.

By hosting this library I enable the people I connect with to meet and network with each other and I enable others working with youth and poverty to find information they could use to support their own innovation and decision making.

I stay awake some night just thinking of new ways to try to attract people to this information.

Every six months I host a conference in Chicago, intended to draw some of the people in my network, and links library, together on a face-to-face basis. Some people do workshops to share their expertise. Some people just participate to expand their network.

The next conference is May 29 and 30, 2008 and will be held at the Northwestern University School of Law. The web site is http://www.tutormentorconference.org. I am now recruiting workshop presenters and I hope you'll either consider doing a workshop, or you'll make an effort this week to tell people in your own network about this event, so they can participate.

The conference is just part of a sequence of events intended to help more and better tutor/mentor programs grow in high poverty neighborhoods of big cities like Chicago. It's intended to draw volunteers and donors directly to more than 200 different organizations in Chicago alone. You can find links to these in the T/MC Find A Program section.

I'll sleep better once we have the roster of speakers in place. We'll all sleep better when we can surround kids with a greater range of adult supports and learning opportunities that create the type of hope, and opportunity, that is being promised in the current election cycle.

I hope you'll help.

Donating Used Computers

Are you looking for a computer for your non profit? Are you looking to recycle used computers. Read this article and watch the videos on NorthShoreInsider. Andy Vass is someone I've known for many years and he is doing some great work.

CEO Summit focuses on recruiting business talent

Today, February 13, 2008, in New York City, the Corporation for National and Community Service, the President's Council on Service and Civic Participation, and other government, and corporate leaders will convene the Summit on Corporate Volunteering: Towards a New Definition of Pro Bono.

The goal of the Summit is to move toward 'pro bono' service becoming as common in the business world as it is in the legal field. The audience at the Summit will be corporate executives and we hope that the corporate community will leave the summit convinced of the benefits of pro bono service and skilled professional volunteering.

All materials from the Summit will be posted on the CNS Web site.

Jim Morsch, of the Lawyers Lend A Hand Program in Chicago, was a participant in the Summit. His observations can be found here.

If this topic interests you, I encourage you to read some of the articles posted on this blog about leadership, maps, and No Child Left Behind. As you or your company develop a strategy, I encourage you to use maps to focus your help in all of the places where you do business, operate a facility, or where your employees live. I encourage you to use your marketing and visibility to give attention to volunteer service on an on-going basis, just as you use these tools to expand the visibility and market share of your company and its products and services.

Finally, I encourage you to use the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site as a resource for your decision making and a partner in your efforts to create a pipeline of kids from poverty to your workforce.

Lawyers support Chicago mentoring with $240,000 in grants!

On January 31, 2008, the SunTimes Judge Marovitz Lawyers Lend a Hand to Youth Program awarded $240,000 in grants to 31 different Chicago area tutor/mentor programs. The map shows the location of recipients in different parts of Chicago. Below is the list of recipients. Web links are included for programs with web sites.

Start Ups (new, and emerging programs - less than five years old):
BUILD
Fathers For the Future Foundation
Inspired Youth
Hermosa Community Organization; also winner of the Much Shelist Founders Award, a $7,000 additional grant
Latino Education Alliance
North Kenwood/Oakland Charter Elementary School
Chicago Development Commission, Inc. (SCDCom)
Alliance for Community Peace


Operating Grants for Established Programs

Christ Evangelical Church, Brain Boosters; also winner of 1st Annual SunTimes Literacy Award, a $10,000 additional grant.
Cabrini Connections
Cabrini-Green Tutoring Program, Inc
Christopher House
Circle Urban Ministries
Cluster Tutoring Program
East Village Youth Program
Erie Neighborhood House Mentoring Program
Family Matters
Horizons for Youth
Jewish Child Family Services
Centro Communitario Juan Diego; also winner of the 2007 Thomas A. Demetrio Award, a $10,000 additional grant.
Life Directions
Maywood Youth Mentoring Program
McGaw YMCA Project SOAR
Midtown Educational Foundation
Partnership to Educate and Advance Kids (PEAK)
Scholarship Chicago
Sunlight African Community Center
The Bridge Youth and Family Services
UMOJA Student Development Corporation
YMCA North Lawndale Mentoring Program

Innovative Grants for long-term projects

Tutor/Mentor Connection(TMC) - $30,000 per year for two years.

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Metropolitan Chicago, mentoring program with
Better Boys Foundation awarded a $10,000 grant.


14 years ago when the Lend A Hand Program was just starting, only one award, of $2,000 was given. By 2006 the total amount of grants that had been awarded was nearly $500,000. The huge growth in 2007 is due to the receipt of a special award from the Chicago SunTimes, which will enable the Lend A Hand to give grants of this level for at least the next 10 years.

However, while this money is important, the average grant was around $5,000. This is a small fraction of the operating cost of most tutor/mentor programs. Thus, we urge leaders in other industries, in faith communities, and in civic and social networks, to duplicate this generosity, so that volunteers, and dollars, can come to tutor/mentor programs in Chicago from many different directions.

This is truly what is meant when we say "it takes a village to raise a child."

Mapping for Justice Blog - Take a look

I encourage you to visit the Mapping for Justice blog each Monday to follow the progress of the T/MC in updating its capacity to use maps for social justice, collaboration and to help make more and better tutor/mentor programs available in high poverty neighborhoods.

Cabrini Connections Arts & Video Festival

On Friday, February 8th, the Cabrini Connections tutor/mentor program held an Arts and Video Festival in Chicago. Click here to read more about this event.

Lawyers in Chicago Lend A Hand - with $240,000 in grants!!

On January 31, 2008 33 different Chicago area volunteer-based tutoring and mentoring were given grants totaling $240,000 by the SunTimes Judge Marovitz Lawyers Lending a Hand to Youth Program. Next week I'll post a complete list of winners. Let me just say that one program receiving a grant of $5,000 was Cabrini Connections, the tutor/mentor program that I've led since 1993.

We started Cabrini Connections with just 7 volunteers, 5 teens, and no money in 1993. Since then more than 500 youth and 600 volunteers have been involved. Look here to see some of the metrics that we use to evaluate this program.

When we started Cabrini Connections, we recognized that no one in Chicago had a master database of tutor/mentor programs, and no one was leading a year-round marketing effort aimed at helping tutor/mentor programs grow in all parts of the Chicago region. We created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1993 to fill this void.

As we built our database of programs we began to share information and learn what issues all programs had in common. Our first survey in 1994 indicated that many programs were isolated from each other, so in May 1994 we launched the first Tutor/Mentor Leadership Conference. Many programs are constantly searching for volunteers, so we published our database as a printed directory, and sent it to businesses and foundations and media, and to each program. In 1995 we launched a citywide Back to School Volunteer Recruitment Campaign, intended to help all programs get volunteers as school starts each year.

Most tutor/mentor programs are non-profits, and most programs are constantly looking for operating dollars, so in June 1994 when the Lend a Hand Program was just starting, and was a part of the Chicago Bar Foundation, we suggested "why don't you become the first foundation to fund general operations of constanly improving tutor/mentor programs in all parts of Chicago." We agreed to work together to achieve that goal, and while the first award in 1994 was $2,000 to a single program, the grant total at the January 31 distribution of 2007 awards, was $240,000. Part of that was a $30,000 grant to the Tutor/Mentor Connection to help us keep doing what we do to maintain this information on tutor/mentor programs, and to support the growth of tutor/mentor programs.



One of the people most responsible for this growth is Jim Morsch, Managing Partner of the Butler Rubin Saltarelli & Boyd LLP Law Firm. Jim was one of the first volunteers to join the Lend A Hand Advisory Board and to see the great potential of lawyers helping kids in all parts of Chicago, not just in one or two highly visible programs. I encourage you to visit the Lend A Hand web site to meet Jim and others who are part of this great program.

One of the ways Jim and the Lend A Hand Raise visibility for tutoring and mentoring, and raise money for the annual grants to tutor/mentor programs, is through events like the Annual Barristers Big Band Benefit Ball, which is set for March 8, 2008 at the Standard Club in Chicago. Contact Karina Ayala-Bermejo, Executive Director of the Lend A Hand Program, at 312-554-2041, if you'd like to be a sponsor, or order tickets.

While you can make a bequest or a donation to support the Lend A Hand, you can also search the Program Locator and Chicago Program Links on the T/MC Web site, and find programs that you can support directly, with your time, talent and dollars. As more people give this support, more of our youth will get more consistent adult support and enriched learning, that is essential for success in school, and in life.

Thank you Lend A Hand for helping us do this work.

Non Profit Congress - For the Common Good of Non Profit Sector

I've joined the Non Profit Blog Exchange once again and have been partnered with a blog on the web site of the Non Profit Congress. I had visited this web site in the past, and even posted a few comments, but the blog exchange encouraged me to take a new, and deeper look.

I found a lot of things to like. For instance the overall purpose is to a) Increase Capacity at all levels of nonprofit organizations; b) help networks of non profit leaders grow at the local, state, and national level; and, c) Inspire Engagement at the state and local level to increase involvement in non profit capacity building in all states, across all sectors.

I see many efforts on this site to give a voice to anyone who wants to offer an idea, or wants to get involved. This is good.

Because I'm such a fan of maps, I was pleased to see a map of the United States, that you can click to find contact information for local leaders in different states. Looks like Illinois could use some local leadership.

However, I see room for improvement, too. I'll write about these suggestions here, and post them on the Non Profit Congress web site also.

I think that there are more than a few organizations and networks trying to mobilize others for the common good. However, I don't see that reflected on this web site, with links pointing to others doing similar work. For instance,

a) on Feb. 12 and 13, 2008 the President's Council for Service and Civic Participation is hosting a CEO Summit in New York City, with a goal of unleashing $1 billion in corporate volunteer talent to support the non profit sector.

b) the Non Profit Congress will hold its 2008 National Meeting in Washington, DC on June 1-4. Unfortunately, the National Conference on Volunteerism and Community Service will be held in Atlanta, on June 1-3. My own Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference is May 29 and 30, in Chicago.

While the Non Profit Congress does a good job of enabling people to participate on the site, they, and Points of Light, and others need to enable people attending conferences in one place to connect with others who are attending similar conferences, in other places. In the Tutor/Mentor Conference format we've created a List of Attendees that participants can subscribe to. This encourages people to contact folks who will be attending our conference, before, during, or after the event. It's what happens between conferences that proves the value of a conference, or a network.

I'd like to see more people who convene groups -- for conferences, press releases, research briefings, etc. -- do this, so the people inspired by an event can connect with each other, in a variety of formats, to do the work the conference or event was trying to inspire.

c) while it's great to build a national movement, and generate more public awareness, unless this distributes public attention, volunteers, and operating dollars, to every part of the country, and to small organizations, as well as national brand names, it's not going to help improve the capacity of thousands of non profits who struggle every day to do good work.

I would like to see the Non Profit Congress borrow a concept from the Boston Innovation Hub, and add an issues map, so that people interested in a similar issue could group together more easily, and work within their sub group, not just their state, to achieve the overall goals of the Non Profit Congress.

I would also like to see them point to Internet-based databases that enable volunteers and donors and clients to search for specific programs in specific zip codes.

What's great about the Non Profit Congress is that I can not only write these ideas in my blog, but I'm encouraged to provide them as suggestions on the NPC's web site. I encourage you to take a look, read their blogs, visit the sections on Public Awareness, Capacity Building and Leadership, and become part of this effort.

After the Elections - Still Want to Make a Difference

The Editorial in today's Chicago SunTimes provides 5 ways people can vote with their time and their actions, to make a difference in Chicago. It's a good reminder that while we spend millions to elect a President and other public officials, it is the work of individuals, and groups, that will determine the quality of live in this country.

In past articles I've talked about failing education, and how to respond to acts of violence. In the SunTimes article the writer wrote "Nobody can clean up the big problems on the day in an instant -- the faltering economy, the war in Iraq, global warming."

I agree. And I thank the SunTimes for pointing to the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site as a resource for finding places in Chicago where you can be a tutor, or a donor, or where you can use your talent to help build a web site, or do the accounting, or help with fund raising.

But this is just the starting point. The Tutor/Mentor Connection web site is a resource library, where you can find articles about where tutor/mentor programs are most needed, why they are needed, and how you can help make them more effective. If we want to end poverty, or solve any other major issue, we need to build personal involvement, and build a learning process, so that as we continue our involvement, we understand the issues more, and we can be smarter about how we use our time, talent and dollars.

I outlined these steps here.

If you get involved in tutoring/mentoring, and use the T/MC site as a resource, and a place to share your ideas and experiences with others who are involved in different programs, even in different states, the collective experience of each of us will add up to an army of knowledge, and commitment, that will help any leader we elect to make a bigger difference in the future of our society.

Connecting those you know to tutor/mentor programs

We're nearing the end of National Mentoring Month. Now, what do we do for the next 11 months to assure that more kids who need mentors and would benefit from being part of comprehensive, volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs, are given that opportunity?

I don't know what the budget was for the National Mentoring Month advertising, but to get high profile celebrities, and to have PSAs in media all over the country, represents an expense beyond what any single tutor/mentor program, or any citywide network has.

Furthermore, I don't know what impact the Mentoring Month campaign has because I'm not sure how often the person speaking about his/her mentoring experience is pointing to the place where he/she volunteers, with a goal of drawing new volunteers and new donors to that place.

I do know that in tutor/mentor programs around Chicago and in every city there are great stories taking place every day. Here's a blog on the Cabrini Connections site that introduces you to teens in our art club and shows work they and volunteers have been doing.

In January I pointed to a blog discussion where people were discussing the relative merits of story telling vs metrics as a fund raising strategy.

I believe in story telling and believe that if the thousands of men and women around the country who have been mentors, or have been helped by mentors, would tell their story consistently, they would attract more attention to tutoring/mentoring in general. If they go a step further and provide contact information for the place or places where they have been involved, the story telling can serve as advertising, to draw volunteers and donors to those places.

If they go a step further and say "where I was involved is not the only place in my city where kids need help, or the only program where people are offering tutoring/mentoring" then they can point to resources like the Tutor/Mentor Connection's Chicago Program Locator (archive since 2020) , which enable volunteers and donors and parents to search by zip code to locate programs, and to differentiate those programs between the age group served, as well as the type of tutoring and/or mentoring they offer.

I've created a Make the Connection PDF to illustrate this role of our volunteers and alumni. If more of the people who have been enriched by the tutor/mentor experience, talk about the program where they were involved, and the need that program has for volunteers and donors, the weight of these stories can become 12-months a year advertising that increases support for existing programs and helps new programs grow.

If you can incorporate the ideas of this PDF into a YouTube video, or other forms of training, please do, then send me a copy that I can post on our web site.

Mentoring and Volunteerism as a Drop Out Prevention Strategy

The State of Illinois' Illinois WorkNet! web site added a new message, encouraging business leaders to think of ways their workplace volunteer and civic engagement strategies can incorporate tutoring/mentoring as part of the company or industry workforce development strategy. View the page here.

Many companies support volunteerism. Some even encourage paid time off. Many are involved in tutoring/mentoring. Some provide millions of dollars to fund charter schools. Is this strategic?

In internet forums, and in sessions of the May and November leadership conferences, we encourage business leaders to host discussions around this topic. Share what you're already doing to prepare kids for careers, and to include your volunteerism and philanthropy in support of this strategy. Other companies can learn from you and you can learn from them.

Locating the Drop Out Crisis

More than half the African American students in Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania attend high schools in which the majority of students do not graduate on time, if at all.

This is a crisis, and we need to find ways to get people who don't live in high poverty neighborhoods more personally involved. Read this report and find additional information on the Drop Out Crisis and potential solutions at http://www.learningtofinish.org/doku.php?id=locations

Thanks for a generous donor, the Tutor/Mentor Connection is building 2008 capacity to map this type of information, as THE REST OF THE STORY. We've hired a GIS Intern, who introduces himself on the Mapping for Justice blog.

Complex problems require complex solutions

A featured story in today's Chicago Tribunec was about the planned firing of teachers and principals at 8 under performing schools in Chicago. Read it here.

I think that as long as big city school systems only focus on education and school-centered solutions they will never get the outcomes we all want.

I use computer mapping systems to develop poverty maps that show the relationship between poverty and poorly performing schools. I overlay this with information about churches, business, hospitals and universities in or near the high poverty areas, or to show expressways, like the Eisenhower, which link people who live in affluent suburbs with their jobs in the Loop. These people go past poverty neighborhoods every day as the come and go to work. Here's an example.

I also use the tutormentorconnection web site to host research articles written by experts in many parts of the country, so that anyone who reads an article in the Tribune or SunTimes, can dig deeper to understand the problem, and to understand how others are trying to find solutions.

My purpose in all of this is to increase the understanding and personal involvement of people who don't live in poverty, and don't live near low performing schools, but who are seriously impacted by the success or failure of our city to prepare young people for 21st century jobs and adult responsibilities.

This is intended to support the growth of a non-school learning, mentoring and tutoring network, that businesses use as part of their own workforce diversity and development strategies. At the links below you can read more about this strategy:

Collaboration Strategies

Role of Leaders

Find A Tutor/Mentor Program where you can volunteer time, talent and/or dollars

Communicating Impact. Numbers or Stories?

I'm looking at more and more grant guidelines asking for 2 or 3 bullet points describing impact expected from their grant. I just read and article on the PhilaTopic blog that discuses the struggle foundations have to describe impact. Numbers or stories. Or both.

What do you think?

I come from an advertising background. Tell the story in a compelling way, with reach (more people) and frequency (more often). That's what I try to do.

Shop for charity involvement based on where the NEED is, before who the organization is.

The strategy of the Tutor/Mentor Connection aims to focus volunteers, donors, leaders, etc. on where tutor/mentor programs are most needed in a city like Chicago, before we focus on who the programs are that offer tutoring/mentoring.

That's because good tutor/mentor programs are needed in every neighborhood. It's not enough to support a good program in one neighborhood, if a different neighborhood also has high poverty, violence and poorly performing schools.

Once a volunteer and donor are shopping based on location, then the Program Locator helps you determine what organizations in the neighborhood offer various forms of tutoring and/or mentoring, and what age group they serve.

This is no guarantee that these are great programs. They are programs that are already in the area and can become great if they are consistently supported by volunteers and donors and if their leadership strives to grow from good to great.

It's a strategy that anyone can own, and anyone can lead. Everyone who reads a newspaper story about violence, poverty or poor schools, or is concerned about global competitiveness, or workforce development, is a potential leader and owner and advocate for this strategy.

Form a group, learn about the issues, learn to differentiate one program from another, just as you compare one grocery store to another, and one telephone to another. Then use that information to help tutor/mentor programs in the neighborhood you adopt, to grow from good to great so they do more to help kids escape poverty through education and workforce mentoring.

If business, professional, hospital and university leaders adopt this strategy, we can create a Chicagoland system of excellent tutor/mentor programs, making more learning, enrichment and mentoring available in the non-school hours, in neighborhoods where kids need more help. Through this, we can help Arne Duncan and Chicago Public Schools do more to reach his vision of a system of excellent high schools throughout the city of Chicago.

What's our promise to our kids? What will our elected leaders do to keep this promise?

The Presidential campaign is coming to Illinois, which means we'll be bombarded with stories of hope, and change. It would give me more hope for the future, if I could see change in the way elected leaders (and candidates) act as leaders.

I have led a volunteer-based tutor/mentor program since 1974. I formed Cabrini Connections in 1993 to help teens from the original 2nd to 6th grade program at the Montgomery Ward HQ in Chicago get the extra support they need from 7th grade through high school, in order to be prepared for college, vocational education, and the next steps to a job and a career.

When kids and volunteers join us we're making one promise: We will do everything we can to assure that each student who joins us will be starting a job/career by age 25. We are only limited by how much our students, volunteers, alumni and supporters are willing to share this responsibility.

Below is a message I shared with our volunteers to start 2008. This message can be just as relevant to volunteers in any tutor/mentor program, or to people looking to be elected to city, state and national office. 

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I hope that all of our volunteers have had great holidays and that you are looking forward to continuing your role as a tutor/mentor volunteer at Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection.

As you prepare for the second half of the school year, I encourage you to read some of the articles posted at Cabrini Connections - Tutor/Mentor Program in the Cabrini Green area of Chicago (archive.org)

I've been a leader of a tutor/mentor program since 1974, and I've learned that every volunteer and student are different, and constantly changing. Thus, while I can provide a structure for your participation, I can't teach you everything you need to know, or everything I've learned. I can try to help you, and your student, form a learning strategy, where you know where to find information, and find help, so that as you meet weekly, you know where to go for ideas to stimulate and support your involvement. 

Last Christmas, Rebecca Parrish (a Cabrini Connections volunteer) gave me the book "The Starfish and the Spider" as a present. As I read it, I realized that this book was describing Cabrini Connections and the role of every volunteer, staff member, and leader. It also describes the role of alumni, and veteran volunteers. 

We are a decentralized organization in which each volunteer is the CEO of his/her own tutoring/mentoring business. We succeed in life by our own efforts and by what we can learn from others. Our networks are important. They expand opportunities, open doors and provide resources. 

As you go through the tutoring year, each volunteer is learning to individualize his/her weekly activities based on the needs of your student, your own abilities and time, and the level of experience you have gained. Veteran volunteers, alumni, staff and coordinators are able to support you with ideas, information, and structure, but it is your own learning and networking with other volunteers that gives you ideas for what you do. 

Each week I'm trying to coach you with this email, with my blogs, and with the information and networks available to you on the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site at http://www.tutormentorconnection.org 

You all already know how difficult it is to motivate many kids to do home work, do extra learning, and take charge of their lives. Imagine how difficult it is for me and the leaders of Cabrini Connections to recruit busy people like our volunteers, and convince them to spend time beyond their weekly tutoring/mentoring, learning how they can become more effective tutors/mentors, or giving help to others who are seeking help. 

Yet, this is the only way we can succeed in keeping the promise we make to our kids. Read more at http://cabriniblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/good-to-great-in-decentralized.html

I thank you all for your involvement in Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection. On behalf of our volunteer board of directors, I welcome you back for our 16th year of tutoring/mentoring since January 1993.

Dan Bassill
President/CEO

Cabrini Connections 

Tutor/Mentor Connection 

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In what ways will our elected leaders support the involvement of volunteers, donors, businesses and universities in programs like Cabrini Connections? Will they use maps to build a distribution of resources into every neighborhood where tutor/mentor programs are needed? Will they use their blogs, web sites, public speaking to connect volunteers with non profits in their district, using links to a Program Locator, so volunteers and donors can search for where to get involved? 

Or will the volunteer and donate button on their web site only point to themselves, in an effort to get elected, or stay elected? 

True leadership lifts up everyone. Real Generals understand the need to distribute troops in all places where the enemy is concentrated, and they understand the need to have an infrastructure that supports those troops with food, clothing, pay, training, weapons, etc. so they are better equipped than the enemy.

Which of our leaders are going to be demonstrating this type of leadership when they come to Illinois and ask for our vote?

Is National Mentoring Month Helping You Recruit Volunteers, or Donors?

We're in the middle of the annual National Mentoring Month, and I'd like to know what impact this is having on volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in Chicago, or other cities.

Are you getting calls from potential volunteers? Are donors calling or sending checks? What's the impact?

Do you even need volunteers at this time of year? The Cabrini Connections program starts in September and runs through May each year. Our goal is that we keep 85% of the volunteers who are with us in October for the entire year. Thus, in January, we're only looking for a few replacements, and for volunteers who give their talent to help us support these volunteers, and our students.

We're also looking for operating dollars so we can fund everything we need to do each year, including pay the rent, insurance, staffing, etc.

What about you? Is this an important time for you to recruit volunteers? Is the campaign helping you?

NEXT WEEK: Is the Presidential Campaign helping you?

“Welcome to Chicago, Mr. President. Here are three kids “Left Behind”

Today the front page of the Chicago SunTimes had a full page picture of President Bush, with the message, “Welcome to Chicago, Mr. President. Here are three kids “Left Behind”. The sub head was President Bush comes to town today, primed to spread the gospel on No Child Left Behind. But so far he hasn’t delivered for too many Chicago Students.”

You can read this story here. http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/728730,CST-EDT-edit07.article

While I agree with the message, I’m disappointed that the paper did not point to web sites with more information on this subject, so that readers can learn more. They could have pointed to NCLB links on the T/MC web site

Or they could have pointed to articles on the tutor/mentor blog, with links to NCLB stories.

The role of a leader, and a newspaper, should be to bring people together, to build a greater understanding of a problem, and to mobilize resources to solve the problem. That's what we're trying to do through the Tutor/Mentor Connection and the resources on our web site.

We think tutoring/mentoring not only transforms the life of a child, but it transforms the life of the volunteer. Longterm involvement in a well organized program creates a bridge of understanding that is crossed by a child as he learns from an adult, and is crossed by the adult as he/she learns about poverty.

Until more adults cross this bridge, this nation will never have the will power or the leadership to make sure No Child is Left Behind. We'll never have enough resources of dollars, volunteers, leaders, technology to reach more of these kids in high poverty neighborhoods with the types of learning and support that overcomes the negative influence of concentrated, big city poverty.

Visit these sites and browse through the sections of this blog to see how you can be a leader in this mobilization.

General Colin L. Powell leads January Mentor Mobilization

January is National Mentoring Month and in TV, radio and print media national celebrities like General Colin L. Powell, Grammy Award-winning R&B recording artist Usher and music icon Quincy Jones, and a variety of other celebrities will be raising attention and mobilizing volunteers and leaders to support mentoring activities throughout the country.

Follow these links to read the Press Release, see featured celebrities, and view actions that individuals, companies, civic and faith groups, can take to support volunteer-based mentoring programs throughout the country.

I've led a volunteer-based tutor/mentor program for more than 30 years and currently lead the Cabrini Connections program in Chicago. I strongly support this campaign and hope that the media messages will motivate more of our private and public sector leaders to spend time learning more about how they can use their leadership strategically to support the growth of volunteer-based mentoring, and tutoring, programs.

I've written about the Mentoring Month, and General Powell's leadership before. Thus, I encourage you to visit the links below to see what I mean by strategic, and how Generals should be using MAPS, to point to where tutor/mentor programs are most needed, and to point reinforcements to the programs that are already in these areas, and need consistent, flexible operating support to build and maintain long-term mentoring connections with hard-to-reach youth.

On the National Mentoring Month Page is a featured article on Drop Out Prevention. Read the articles I've posted here and here and follow the links that illustrate tutor/mentor programs as a workforce development strategy.

View the charts that show the PUSH/PULL relationship of programs that PUSH kids to make good decisions, and business strategies that link kids to jobs and PULL them through school toward jobs and careers. Read more about Mentoring as a Workforce Development Strategy here and here.

Finally, read the essay titled ROLE OF LEADERS. If the leader of your church, company, university, hospital, or community does not make a long-term commitment to use resources strategically, I think most of the media attention generated by this year's Mentoring Month will be just more money and time spent with too little results in return.

Act Locally. Influence Globally. Add this to your 2008 Resolution

This photo describes the strategy of Cabrini Connections and the Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC). While we operate one tutor/mentor program in the Near North part of Chicago (LOCAL), we created the T/MC (GLOBAL)to help tutor/mentor programs grow in all high poverty neighborhoods of Chicago and its suburbs. Through the Internet, we're sharing this strategy and enlisting partners in big cities throughout the country.

We'd like to encourage businesses, colleges, civic and health care groups to adopt this local/global strategy. It's very expensive to operate a tutor/mentor program, and it takes many years for a program to become great, as well as a minimum of 6 years for a youth to go from 7th grade to high school graduate. Thus, while a company can put great energy into one or two sites, they really only reach a few kids out of the more than 200,000 living in poverty in Chicago, or the approximately 13 million living in poverty around the country.

However, if a company uses its advertising, public relations, internal communications, etc. to encourage employees and customers to get involved in tutor/mentor programs all over the city, or in many cities, it can influence what happens in many tutor/mentor programs, and the lives of thousands of kids.

What's great about this concept is that this form of leadership is not really very expensive. It's a mindset. Business uses all sorts of advertising to influence the actions of millions of people. If they apply this same thinking they can influence hundreds of tutor/mentor locations. In addition, they probably will also learn more ways to make the local programs they operate much more effective. That's what we've learned. By operating the Tutor/Mentor Connection we actually have done more to help our own Cabrini Connections program grow.

Follow the links at the left side of this page, or skim through the articles I've written over the past 2 years, and learn how your church, business, law firm, university, and/or high school service learning project can adopt this thinking in your own efforts.

Have a safe, happy new year. I'll add some more to this blog tomorrow.

The Spiritual Connection

Does your spirituality drive your social entrepreneurship? This is the question on the Social Edge web site (now only available on web archive) this week.

I responded by saying that I believe there has been a spiritual force guiding my 30 years of involvement in tutoring/mentoring, and that this force helps me connect with others at different times and in different ways.

I write about these connections on this blog, and in each article, I link to others who I'm connecting with, or learning from. If you browse the links along the left side of this page, you'll see that each leads to other web pages, with listings of other tutor/mentor programs, or with discussions where I contribute and learn. In addition, many of these web sites link to even more sites, where I would like to spend time learning if I could stretch each day into 40 hours instead of 24.

I can't do that. Thus, my hope for 2008 is that some of you who read this blog will either take on the role of network builder, researcher, advocate, or you will recruit others in your own network to take on this role.

I hope you'll browse the various links and visit the forums that I visit, and that we can connect in one or more. In addition, if you are meeting in other forums where there are great ideas, and a great focus on actions that many people take to help millions of kids stay in school and reach careers, please forward the link to me so I can join, and I can connect others in my network to these new places of learning.

Thank you to everyone who has supported Cabrini Connections and the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 2007, with your time, your talent, and your dollars. I look forward to connecting with you in more strategic ways in 2008.

Many to One, Not One to Many

The image of the lonesome warrior is one that reminds me of the men and women who are fighting overseas to make this a better world. As we count our blessings, let's pray for the young people in our armed forces.

However, this image is also one that I think of when I think of the people leading social benefit organizations around the world, mostly in isolation, mostly with too few resources to do everything they are trying to do.



Those who lead small non profits, or are struggling to get social benefit ideas launched, may related to this One-To-Many graphic. We're constantly reaching out in many different directions, trying to find the help we need. We're like fish in a bowl, competing with thousands of others for a limited amount of dollars and volunteers. Unless you've got a powerful marketing machine, or are well connected in donor circles, you succeed some of the time, but not most of the time, and you spend tremendous amounts of emotional capital and energy all of the time.



Through the Tutor/Mentor Connection, I'm trying to change this. I'm trying to recruit leaders in many places who lead strategic thinking process in their organization that aligns social benefit with corporate and organizational strategy. Such leaders will use their own advertising, visibility and resources to support the growth of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs that lead kids to careers, because it's a core business strategy.

See this concept map at http://tinyurl.com/TMI-Many-to-1

I've been saying this for a long time, but last week I found an article on the Harvard Business Review that reinforces this concept. The article is titled Strategy & Society: The Link Between Competitive Advantage and Corporate Social Responsibility. Written by Michael E. Porter and Mark R. Kramer.

Education and workforce development are of strategic importance for most industries. Thus, if leaders of business, health care, law, journalism, sports and entertainment, etc. are strategic, they can use tools like the Program Locator and Chicago Program Links to choose what part of a city they want to support, and what programs they want to help grow from good to great.

This isn't a strategy to support just one tutor/mentor program, or one brand name like the Boys and Girls Clubs, it's a strategy to help every high poverty neighborhood have comprehensive programs that are one end of the pipeline to jobs and careers for businesses that are strategically engaging their corporate resources to help grow their future workforce.

Over the next seven days millions of people will make charitable decisions, either for good will, or for tax deductions. Choose a program like Cabrini Connections, which I led from 1992 to 2011, or one of the others listed in the Links Library, and this will show the impact of Many to One.

Building Networks of Purpose

Every day I spend time building networks of support for volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago region, and looking for ways to help these programs have a growing impact on the lives of inner city kids and the volunteers who become part of their lives.

This networking connects me with many different tutor/mentor programs and supporters in Chicago, and with similar groups and leaders in other parts of the country and the world.

On Friday, December 14 this networking took me to Wisconsin, where I was a speaker in a Mentoring Conference held in Kenosha, that served as the kickoff of the Kenosha-Racine Mentoring Network. The featured speaker was the Executive Director of the Minnesota Mentoring Partnership, and another speaker was Kathy Munson, from the Wisconsin Mentoring Partnership. Thus, by organizing this conference, the leaders (from the University of Wisconsin-Parkside) were connecting mentoring leaders from three states. By my writing about this on my blog, I hope I'm connecting mentoring leaders from many other places with these groups and with our groups in Chicago. Mentor Kenosha-Racine has set up their own blog, and I encourage you to connect with them.

Following the morning conference, I attended a meeting of the Wisconsin Mentoring Partnership planning team. This volunteer organization has representatives from Milwaukee and other parts of the state and their aim is to build a network mirroring best practices in Minnesota, Michigan and other states. I've met with leaders of this group for over 10 years, sharing strategies of the Tutor/Mentor Connection.

After the conference in Kenosha, Wisconsin, I drove back to Chicago to attend a holiday party hosted by Dr. James Galloway, whom I met in September when I participated in a Health Careers conference, focused on American Indian and Alaska Eskimo youth. Following our meeting, I've participated in an on-line forum connecting members of the Pathways into Health Careers network, and Dr. Galloway was a speaker at the Tutor/Mentor Leadership Conference in November. During Friday evenings social gathering, I met others from the public health field, and hopefully some of these connections will become future partners of the T/MC and future supporters of tutor/mentor program growth throughout Illinois and the Midwest.

In today's newspapers there were letters to the editor about the Poverty Gap, and articles the drew attention to poverty in various parts of Illinois. In the Parade Magazine the front page featured the highly visible Oprah Winfrey and Denzel Washington, talking about ways to give to charity.

The one article that I felt was most important, was one that talked about how the huge charitable donations from the Bill Gates foundation, intended to solve major public health issues around the world, was having an unintended impact of reducing support for basic human services.

On the T/MC web sites I use charts and maps to illustrate the many different organizations who need to be working in a neighborhood to help youth grow up safely and move to jobs and careers, as well as the many different neighborhoods where such help needs to be funded for many, many years.

My holiday wish is that leaders like Gates, Denzel and Oprah would support complex problem solving blueprints such as I'm piloting so that their visibility could result in a distribution of flexible, on-going operating dollars, from big, and small donors, to all of the different non-profits who are part of the village needed to raise children in America and the World.

Growing Corporate Support for Charter Schools in Chicago

Mayor Daley and Arne Duncan have called on the Chicago business community, and local and national foundations to help raise $50 million to support Renaissance 2010 which is the Mayor's plan to make 100 new schools available in Chicago to under-served youth. In response, the Civic Committee of The Commercial Club of Chicago committed to help raise $25 million and created the Renaissance Schools Fund (RSF) to support the transformation of Chicago’s public schools through greater choice and competition, and to provide all families with high-quality educational options.



This map shows locations of new or planned charter schools. A list of corporate donors shows commitments ranging from $250,000 to over $2 million. The map, list of schools and links to other stories can be found on the Medill Reports web site.



The Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC) supports this strategy, but as the chart above shows, we also feel that unless funds are not put into learning and mentoring that takes place out of the school and beyond the school day, the new schools will soon be struggling with the same challenges of the former schools, in that not enough kids come to school motivated, and prepared to learn, and not enough kids have an adult network expanding their learning, their aspirations, and their opportunities for jobs and careers beyond school.

Just getting a school started will not be enough to assure the success of a youth from when he enters one of these new schools at first, 6th or 9th grade. Business needs to stay involved for many years, encouraging employees to be involved as volunteers, leaders, donors, and innovating workforce-development strategies that can help more kids build the soft skills needed to succeed in school and work.

It's a good challenge as we head into 2008.

Building Public Will - Expanding the Choir

If you've read past articles on this blog, you can see that I'm singing the same song, over and over, trying to connect people who can help, such as volunteers, donors, business leaders, with tutor/mentor programs that have a long-term, volunteer-based strategy of mentoring inner-city kids through school and into careers.

In many ways, I'm a choir of one, I'm singing solo. I'm a whisper in the wilderness. In order to achieve the goals I write about, I need to expand the size of the choir, enlist more people to sing different parts of the music, and take different roles in this orchestra.

The result, is a growing reverberation, or Hallelujah Chorus, of people supporting youth in different neighborhoods of Chicago, and different neighborhoods of other big cities around the country...and the world.

So, how do we do this. How do we build the public will needed to not just support tutoring/mentoring, but willing to sacrifice more than token levels of time, talent and dollars, for many years, even decades.

I don't have a simple solution. I do have a path. I point to web sites where other people are writing about this topic, and educating their readers. Thus, every time you visit my blog, or the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site, you're pointed to other places where researchers, writers, tutor/mentor leaders, are educating readers about why and where and how they can help build this public support for programs that use volunteers in many roles to mentor inner city kids toward jobs and careers.

Everyone who reads one of my articles and shares it with a friend, or who passes on a link to the T/MC web site, is taking a role in this choir. Thank you.

Since we're in the year-end fund raising period, here's a few articles that I encourage you to read which related to building public support, and raising funds for non profits. I hope many readers will uses these ideas to raise money during December, and 2008, for volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs, such as Cabrini Connections.

Building Public Will at this page on Internet Archive. 

From Spare Change to Real Change: The Social Sector as a Beta Site for Business Innovation - http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/2974.html

How to Use the Internet for Group Fund Raising - http://www.socialactions.com/site/how-to-use-the-internet-for-group-fundraising (no longer available)

Guidelines for Funding Non Profits - call for general operating support - find here on Internet Archive

Follow the links at the side of this blog and in the LINKS LIBRARY and you'll find many other people who are sharing information and raising awareness, in an effort to mobilize resources for organizations working with at risk kids, and working to help more kids prepare for 21st century careers.

As we head through December, many people will be thinking of ways to share their blessings, or make this a better world. Cabrini Connections is not the only tutor/mentor program in Chicago. If you point friends and families to places like the Chicago Program Links on the T/MC web site, you can help us build support for Cabrini Connections and all other tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago region and in other cities.

Role of Leaders - Thanks LaSalle Bank/Bank of America

I heard a radio commercial as I drove to work this morning. It was created by LaSalle Bank/Bank of America, and encourages holiday donors to visit the bank and make donations to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Chicago.

When I describe the Role of Leaders, this is one of my goals. I'd like to see leaders in every industry use their advertising to draw volunteers and donors to volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring programs in all parts of the city, not just the Boys and Girls Clubs.

Most tutor/mentor programs are small. They don't have the brand name and clout of the Boys & Girls Clubs, YMCA, or Big Brothers Big Sisters, yet many do great work and many operate in neighborhoods where these groups don't have facilities. They can't find enough donors on their own, so the T/MC seeks to engage leaders in business and churches to use their advertising to help these various organizations get the resources during the year end holidays, and throughout the year that help them stay connected to kids.

Here's an example of how a leadership group in the Chicago legal community is supporting tutor/mentor programs: Lawyers Lend-A-Hand Program

If people are encouraged to visit the Chicago Program Links they can find many choices in many neighborhoods. If advertising from different businesses focuses on different parts of the city, or in all neighborhoods where a company does business, then we do more to support the growth of tutor/mentor programs throughout the city.

If your church, hospital, civic group, or business is integrating charity giving, or volunteerism into its advertising, please include this link, and send us an email to tell us what you're doing.

Mentoring as part of larger strategy:

Mentoring has become hugely popular over the past 10 years. I encourage you to read a new Public/Private Ventures Brief, titled Mentoring, Policy and Politics, written by Gary Walker, which illustrates how it became such a widely accepted strategy. (You can download the report from the P/PV site.)

The final sentence of this report, in a section titled “Future Directions” states “Infiltration, not consolidation, is where mentoring’s greatest usefulness lies in the years ahead.”

I wrote about this in the Articles section of the Tutor/Mentor Connection site and encourage you to read my comments after you've read the P/PV article.

If you'd like to submit an article to rebut or support my thinking, I encourage you to do so. However, if you support the idea of mentoring as part of a larger strategy, then I encourage you to look for ways to connect with the T/MC during 2008 so we can expand business and philanthropic support, which is essential for building and sustaining high quality tutor/mentor programs.

Follow the links.

I've been building this blog for over two years now. I keep adding links to the left side of the page, to sites that I visit, which are entry points for vast areas of learning.

I just updated the list today and added a link to The Raiser's Raiser a blog that writes about fund raising, and posts links to other articles of interest. If you lead a tutor/mentor program, or are a volunteer or donor, I encourage you to read some of these articles and follow the other links on the page.

I can't teach everything I know, or everything that is known by others in this world. I can provide a path to information I think it's important for me to know and that I hope you'll use to guild your own learning

Connecting with Public Health Community

A couple of months ago I pointed out a report titled "Reframing School Drop Out as a Public Health Issue."

Today I found the web site of the Oxford Health Alliance Initiative. It's LINKS sections is extensive, and the site offers excellent networking and collaboration features. (12-2018 note: this site no longer active. Use Community Health Solutions as a resource.)

I wish I had time to browse all of these links and see what connections I can make between them and the work the Tutor/Mentor Connection is doing, but I don't. So I'm appealing to readers to take on this role.

In a way, I'm looking for volunteers to take the role of "scout bees" who go out looking for food sources, then alert "worker bees" who bring the food back to a bee hive. Here's an article on eLearnspace that prompted my thinking on this.

If you follow this analogy, the T/MC web site is the bee hive/colony. People who go out through the internet and share information, like I do here, and here, are acting like scout bees. They are sharing our information in a wider network and are connecting the people and information in these networks to the T/MC web site and those who visit it.

In many ways the scout bees are network weavers, acting to connect information and knowledge, with a purpose of making good things happen that are not possible by the efforts of people working in small groups, and in isolation from each other.

By reading this blog, and passing it on to others, you're taking the role of a scout bee, worker bee, and network weaver.

The Legend of Will Smith - Super Role Model

I just finished reading an article about actor Will Smith, in the current issue of TIME. What a story! What an example of purposeful living! I already liked his movies. Now, I like the man.

Why? In an error where everything that goes wrong is someone else's fault, this young man seems to recognize that he has the power to make things go right. Maybe not all the time, but often enough that life is good.

There are some habits described in this article that we could all learn from. If we could instill these habits in our youth, we'd have a lot less crime, a lot less drop outs, and a lot fewer worries for their future.