The abstract says "Knowledge sharing and creation are considered key processes leading to innovation and organizational performance. Several organizational initiatives have focused on building communities of practice in order to create a platform where employees can share experiences and insights."
The article goes on to show the value of people who help organize these communities of practice and who use the Internet to connect people from different locations and different parts of the organization. It also talks about how companies are becoming intentional in how they support the growth of such networks.
I've suggested for many years that companies that strategically encourage and support on-going employee involvement in tutor/mentor programs should do this as part of their own workforce and talent development strategies. As volunteers connect in tutor/mentor programs they begin to build bonds with youth and the organizations. They begin to have questions of "what to do" and "what more can I do to help the child, or help the organization." Many programs provide social activities and are beginning to use social media to connect their volunteers to each other and to coach the ongoing invovlvement of volunteers and young people.
I believe there is an opportunity for companies and industries to form communities of practice and learning circles consisting of employees from many locations and branches of a company who share ideas with each other based on involvement they have with many different tutor/mentor programs. Such ongoing idea sharing can empower each volunteer with more ideas that they can bring to their weekly tutoring/mentoring and to the way they support the organization where they volunteer.
However, it can also lead to new innovations in how the company or industry uses its own resources to support multiple organizations providing the same type of service in different locations.
While this would have a growing impact on the availability and quality of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs it also would create informal social networks connecting people from different parts of a company which would lead to many of the benefits described in the paper I've pointed to.
In addition, employees who take on the role of network facilitator supporting employee involvement in social causes will build skills that they can bring to building and sustaining communities of practice focused on internal corporate goals. Gaining such skills from volunteer involvement has limited cost but potentially great benefit to the company.
So how do we encourage this type of growth? Companies who already support this type of community of practice should connect their internal communities to external communities who focus on the same issues. Companies can create face-to-face connection opportunities by encouraging employee involvement in the May and November Tutor/Mentor Conferences we host in Chicago and that others host in other cities.
This Role of Leaders PDF shows ways CEOs can encourage employee involvement in volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in cities where they do business. I'd be happy to work with companies, hospitals and professional associations to help you build communities of practice focused on helping volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs grow in more places.
We can connect in forums like http://tutormentorconnection.ning.com or on Facebook or LinkedIn or in forums already hosted by company teams. Let's connect.
One year ago this week I left my President, CEO role at Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection and embarked on a new journey as the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. If you're interested in seeing why the change took place read these blog articles.
The big challenge has been finding talent and revenue. Most individuals who supported me as a non profit between 1993 and 2011 find it difficult to continue to support the same work under an LLC (for profit) structure. Most foundations only support non profits or social enterprises with a business plan that promises a financial return on investments made. Finding volunteers who can and will manage the technology or help with building a business plan has been difficult, but I have had some help in this area.
Let me clarify a few things:
a) I did not have a volunteer team in place, with civic reach and a commitment to the vision of the Tutor/Mentor Connection in July 2011. Without that a non profit has no chance of finding the investment capital needed to thrive.
b) I'm 65. Thus, in building a new non profit I need to find volunteers who want to "own the vision" and carry it forward for another 20 years after I'm no longer involved. I keep looking for such people. It's a difficult commitment to make.
c) Thus I created Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC to offer structure, a new way to generate revenue, and a new way to create potential partnerships with people and organizations in many cities who have the same problems of high poverty as Chicago. I've operated for the past year on less than $11,700 in revenue. I've kept expenses to under $24,000. I've paid the difference from my own savings and have not drawn a salary.
This is Chicago. It's the 3rd largest city in the United States. If you search for "tutor mentor" on Google or other search engines my sites come up on the first page. In this "nitch" market, I'm the top resource. Who are the advertisers or sponsors that would want to partner with me?
I've posted several articles over the past year showing that social enterprises do the same work as non profits, but with a different tax structure.
Today I'd like to share the thinking of Susan Ellis, President of Energize, Inc. on why she chose not to be a non profit.
"Why We Are a For-Profit Company
This question arises periodically, so here is what Susan Ellis has to say:
I could have opted to make Energize a nonprofit organization, recruit a volunteer board of directors, raise funds, and put myself on salary. Instead, I had a conscious, philosophical reason for taking the for-profit route. I have watched too many nonprofits convince third-party funders of the value of their services, while those who actually receive the services are dubious of their worth. Since funders rarely ask the end users what they think, grants continue to be awarded mainly on the skills of the organization's proposal writers. The only way that I could be certain that my clients valued Energize's services was to establish a direct, customer relationship with them. Many of our customers pay for our training, books, and other help with money they, in turn, get from donors. But the customer decides how to spend that money. If they choose Energize, I feel that is a true endorsement. And that's why I'm proud to have lasted in business for over 30 years."
I've been trying to figure out a business model to generate revenue for to keep the Tutor/Mentor Connection a free service for parents, volunteers, youth, community leaders, etc. At the same time I've spent time every day for the past year maintaining the web sites, building the network, and doing the work that needs to be done.
Creating a business model to support the strategies that I've developed over 18 years is far more difficult that one that supports a new start-up without an existing set of projects that need nurturing every day. I created this wiki to show the range of work I think needs to be included in efforts that reach kids in all high poverty neighborhoods with long-term, mentor rich learning activities.
I can't drop 90% of the Tutor/Mentor Connection strategy and vision just to focus on a single element that might generate revenue. That would be like trying to fight a war with troops in only one location who are armed with rifles but without bullets. It is a comprehensive plan, as John McCarron indicated when he wrote this article in 1995.
One strategy is to find partners or co-owners of individual parts of the strategy shown on the wiki. These could be people in any part of the country or the world.
As I look for such opportunities, I will continue to maintain this information and reach out every day to share it in a growing network of people that I meet on line hoping that others will step forward to fill the talent gaps needed to do this work.
I hope you'll browse through the blog articles I've written since July 2011 and read the essays I started posting on Scribd.com last October. These have already recorded over 18,000 reads.
School starts again in a month and my focus is on helping build greater visibility so that more volunteers and donors support the tutor/mentor programs operating in Chicagoland. That means I also have been trying to reach out to the programs in the Tutor/Mentor Program Locator to check to see if their information is accurate and recruit intermediary groups to help collect information on tutor/mentor programs in different parts of Chicago.
In a recent series of articles on the Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR) the role of "backbone organizations" is discuss, showing how important they are to bringing the entire community together around key challenges. I think the Tutor/Mentor Connection has been doing work that leads to collective efforts, yet without the support of a major corporate foundation or civic leader and in a much larger metropolitan area.
If you agree help me build this platform so it becomes more important to Chicago and can be made available to other cities.
On Sunday, June 3, 2012, I participated in an on-line discussion hosted by the Webheads network and met Curt Bonk, a Professor at Indiana University, and author of The World is Open. Curt talked about Instructional Ideas and Technology Tools for Online Success. The archive is here.
I reached out to Curt on Linked in and we began to exchange messages. He sent me his book which I've read and found to be a great resource. You can see how I used sticky notes to point to pages and links I intended to look up after reading the book. Then I went to this page on his web site and found that he has already done much of this work for me. He has excerpts from each chapter, and has posted links to organizations that he talked about in the book, in a chapter-by-chapter sequence. It's really a great way to connect readers with content.
Curt was in Chicago last Friday and we met for breakfast. So in less than month I went from not knowing he existed, to sitting for breakfast and talking about learning, the Cubs and the Milwaukee Brewers (Curt's from Wisconsin!).
As I've connected to the Webheads and others I'm dramatically expanding my network and the ideas I have available to do my own work in Chicago. Most recently I've participated in a couple of Sunday morning Google Hangouts. You can find links to these in this archive of Webheads events. These are FREE. Anyone can participate.
So what's next? I'd like to create a Google Hangout where I can connect with others who already share my own vision of helping inner-city kids. While I host forums on Ning, Linked in and Facebook, the Google Hangout offers a way for us to connect in live, but informal, conversations and relationship building.
We can talk about the November 19 Tutor/Mentor Conference in Chicago, or Volunteer Recruitment efforts taking place during August and September. Or we can talk about ways to connect during January 2013 National Mentoring Month. Or we can just share a bit about what we do in different programs and different places, what works, and what challenges we need to over come.
Are you interested? Connect with me on Google+ and lets schedule a time to "hang out".
In Chicago there are probably 5,000 adult volunteers serving in organized tutoring and/or mentoring programs as tutors, mentors, and on volunteer board. In the program locator database I show 172 organizations. I'm sure there are additional places where volunteers are connecting with kids, but I don't have that information.
In my own leadership of a tutor/mentor program since 1975 I recognized very early that there was no way I could effectively "teach" 100 or more volunteers everything they needed to know to become effective tutors/mentors. Instead I began to amass a library of reading material and used weekly communications and coaching to try to motivate the volunteers to spend time reading, reflecting and learning.
In theory that's a great idea. In practice, it's difficult to motivate this type of extra effort on an on-going basis. It's also difficult to track and document how much of this was taking place.
So, my question is where are all of these people learning about the challenges faced by the inner-city kids and families they work with? Where do they go to find ideas they can apply each week in their tutoring/mentoring activities? Who coaches this process?
Or, where are they learning about the challenges organizers of tutor/mentor programs face in finding the resources (money, space, technology, ideas, talent, etc.)needed to enable volunteers to connect with inner-city kids and to keep them connected week-after-week for multiple years?
There are more than 200,000 school age youth living in high poverty areas of Chicago. We need thousand more volunteers in this system. Where are people going for data and ideas that could empower them to help programs grow, and to help the kids in these programs become active learners and CEOs in their own lives?
Where do these volunteers go to get this information?
I hope that some of you who read this article will circulate it in your own networks. If there are on-line forums where volunteers, board members and donors are converging I really don't know where they are.
I do know where there are on-line libraries of information that they could be tapping to learn more about where and why tutor/mentor programs are needed, or what the nonprofit organizers face in trying to make these programs available. You can browse the sections of the Tutor/Mentor Connection library to open your world to a virtual universe of information that is just waiting for readers and learners.
Or you can go to Curt Bonk's World is Open web site and see the list of links to on-line learning and education resources that he has amassed.
If we're not spending time learning how can we get better at what we do to help kids overcome the challenges of big city poverty?
I invite anyone who has ideas on this topic to join in a Facebook or Tutor/Mentor Forum conversation and share what you know. Or, post a link to the online learning you know about so myself and others can connect with you there.
Monday's Chicago Sun-Times devoted the first three pages to Mayor Emanuel's response to the high murder rate in Chicago. On page 2 is a full-page commentary by Mary Mitchell, under the headline "We've heard this all before."
Yes, we have. I've posted this front page from the October 15, 1992 Chicago Sun-Times on this blog at least once a year since 1995. I included it in print newsletters I was sending from 1994 to 2001 (while I still had money to do this.)
Because non-profits don't have money to buy the first three pages of a major newspaper to tell their stories I've followed a "Rest of the Story" strategy to try to get this message consistently in front of readers. If you visit the media and violence links on this blog you can see how I point to stories in the daily media then add maps and commentary pointing out the availability, or lack of, tutor/mentor programs in the areas where the media was focusing that day's story. I also point to articles and research that readers can use to dig deeper.
I've primarily followed the two major papers but recognize that many other papers are telling this story. Today my Facebook network pointed me to an article in the Reader, written by Steve Borgia, titled "The root cause of Chicago's glut of murders". In this Steve includes hyperlinks to other articles he's written such as "Separate, Unequal, and Ignored" and "Two mayors, two Chicagos".
My goal is that people who are outraged by the stories they see in the local news will form learning circles in their business, company, school and/or faith group and build their own understanding of the program, and their own belief in strategies that connect kids in poverty neighborhoods with ideas and networks of people beyond their own neighborhoods. Volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs can do this if they are structured to encourage long-term connections of kids and volunteers and if they are available in the neighborhoods where their is the highest degree of poverty and segregation.
One concern I have is that when I point to articles and commentary in the local media those links do not stay in place far into the future. Thus, as people read past articles on a blog, too many of the hyperlinks are broken...even to my own web site. If anyone has suggestions for ways these articles might be archived for future research and planning, please share your thoughts.
The first link on the list is the Connexions library hosted by Rice University. In searching that site for articles on social capital I found this one titled: Applying Adaptive Leadership to Sustain K-12 District Initiatives and Challenges.http://cnx.org/content/m34765/latest/
I was surprised to see the information about Chicago HOPES. I've met with their leaders and hosted them at Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences over the past decade so feel I've had some contribution to their growth. In this blog written by Nicole While, who was on staff with the Tutor/Mentor Connection between 2007 and 2011, you can find a link to a Chicago HOPES Blog that we helped them set up in 2009. Small world, isn't it.
Since the Connexions article invites feedback, I sent this message to the authors:
"My thought would be that we need to find ways to keep leaders in place for longer periods of time so that the knowledge of an organization can grow as well as the relationships formed between leaders in many different groups focused on the same issues. Chicago HOPES relies on National Service volunteers who change every one-to-three years and principles in public schools also change frequently. Leaders and staff in community based non profits working with youth change frequently due to lack of funding and working conditions.
Thus, while there is a huge wealth of knowledge available in places like Connexions and similar on-line libraries, the accumulation of this knowledge in organizations is not consistent because of the changes in people."
One way to help programs keep leaders would be to help them tell their stories and share their 'theory of change' on their own blogs and web sites. The Chicago HOPES blog has not been consistently updated since 2009. In the Chicago Links Library you can find links to nearly 200 youth organizations serving Chicago. Very few have active blogs showing work they do nor do they have sections where they show the thinking and "theory of change" that supports their operations. Without this information on a web site it's very difficult for volunteers, donors and parents to shop and compare and choose what programs to support. To be fair, many organizations are using Facebook as meeting places where they share current information. The Chicago HOPES Facebook page is http://www.facebook.com/chicagohopes
Volunteers, interns, high school students, etc. could take on the role of journalists for programs in different neighborhoods. Tech volunteers could help programs set up pages on their sites to host blogs, post vision statements, and post links to programs that illustrate what they are trying to do. We can connect on-line to share ideas of how we help programs grow. We can also connect in conferences such as the one I host in May and November each year in Chicago.
I write about these issues on this blog and share more ideas on the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC site. I would be delighted to connect with any of you who are interested in sharing ideas and brainstorming "tipping points" where we could influence the retention of key people, the connections of these people, and the ways information on the Internet is being used to support understanding, thinking and strategies.
I'm based in Chicago and have an office in the Highsight.org program at 315 W. Walton.
I've been part of the growth of the Lend A Hand Program since 1994 and love what Dan is doing each year to raise money that can be used to support volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago region. Dan's a lawyer and weight lifter and each year he gathers pledges based on how many pounds he lifts. Through his efforts he has personally contributed more than $200,000 to support tutor/mentor programs in Chicago.We need more heros like Dan, doing the same thing, and helping support-networks grow in every industry, not just in the legal community.
Please read this, share it and become a sponsor if you can.
With the start of summer comes Lifting to Lend-A-Hand X. On Saturday, July 28, I will compete in the American Powerlifting Federation- Amateur American Powerlifting Federation Chicago Summer Bash 9.
Lifting to Lend-A-Hand is something I created ten years ago to be able to raise funds for Lawyers Lend-A-Hand to Youth, whose mission is to channel the legal community’s resources to promote best practice mentoring and tutoring programs in disadvantaged communities that foster consistent, long-term bonds between adults and youth. I believe strongly in the potential for all youth to succeed.
Lifting to Lend-A-Hand X marks multiple milestones. I originally committed to a ten-year campaign, and this is year ten. My goal for those ten years has been $250,000, and we have come close raising a little over $200,000 in cash and in-kind support. Recently, I celebrated my 45th birthday. My personal goal for Lifting to Lend-A-Hand X is to raise $45,000. A big, hairy audacious goal, but one I think I can reach with some help from friends such as you!
I and the programs supported by Lawyers Lend-A-hand need your support.
Lifting to Lend-A-Hand is like a walkathon event. On the competition day, I will compete in a regular powerlifting meet. The best lift in each of the squat, bench,and dead lift will go toward my total. You can make a flat pledge or you can pledge by the pound. (Obviously, my aging knees and hips would appreciate a flat pledge.) If you pledge $.10 per pound and I lift a total of 1,500 pounds, you would owe $150. My expectations are to be in the 1300-1500 range.
Every amount counts! It all adds up to do phenomenal work for our mentoring programs! The biggest donors will be recognized with prominent listing on a shirt I will wear at the meet and listing in the luncheon program book and on the check I will present at the My Hero Awards Luncheon on Thursday, September 20, 2012 (tentative). Donors at the following levels will also receive tickets to the luncheon:
· One ton club - $2,000 or $1.33 per pound - 8 tickets (a table can be 8-10 seats)
· 3/4 ton club - $1,500 or $1 per pound - 6 tickets
· 1/2 ton club - $1,000 or $.67 per pound - 4 tickets
· 1/4 ton club - $500 or $.33 per pound- 2 tickets
You can donate online at http://lawyerslendahand.org/index.php?page=donation. If you prefer to make a pledge, you can send me an email at liftingtolendahand@hotmail.com. Please check to see if your employer matches donations. Each year, your generous individual donations are augmented by employer matches. Every penny raised goes to supporting the program.
Imagine if leaders in every industry were constantly raising money and visibility to encourage volunteer involvement and to fund volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago region. More programs throughout the region would have multiple streams of financial support and a more diverse based of volunteers modeling jobs and careers that kids might aspire to. See some of the leadership ideas in the Tutor/Mentor Forum and look for ways you can "be like Dan" starting this fall.
These are photos from the June 14 Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference held June 14, 2012 at First Unitarian Church in Chicago.
The conference consisted of three panel discussions offering programs a chance to introduce themselves to others and to share ideas about strategies that work.
The panels offered opportunity for question and answer. Videos will be posted on YouTube and on the conference web site video page.
The next conference will be November 19 at the Metcalfe Federal Building in Chicago. I am looking for a few sponsors and for volunteers who will host workshops and be part of panels. See conference details at http://www.tutormentorconference.org
In 2008 I asked interns working with me to visit the Chicago Programs Links section of the Tutor/Mentor Connection library and visit the web site of each program to learn what they were doing and to write a brief review.
I provided this set of criteria:
* Home page features "mentoring or tutoring" with headline words and/or pictures
* Home page has easy-to-find sub-feature of "mentoring or tutoring" with words and/or pictures
* Volunteer involvement opportunity is clear
* Contact information is clear so volunteer or donor can contact program
* Case made for why tutoring/mentoring is important
* Site shows role of tutoring/mentoring in workforce development
* Site shows benefit of volunteer involvement in tutoring/mentoring on the volunteer
* Site provides links to research related to tutoring, mentoring, poverty, education, etc.
* Site links to other tutor/mentor programs in the same city
* Site links to one or more Tutor/Mentor Connection web sites and/or Program Locator
This process of looking at web sites and learning from what they do should be on-going. Every program could learn ideas from each other and use them to improve their own efforts, if they have people doing this comparison and if there were donor/investors ready with talent and dollars that programs can use for constant improvement.
However, many of the web sites don't do as well as they need to in telling the program's story. The talent and time needed to collect stories and tell them via web pages, blogs, videos, etc. is not available in every program. Thus, there is a role for volunteers from business, high schools and/or college to reach out and offer to help programs better tell their stories.
This goes along with the need for teams of volunteers to help collect information about existing tutor/mentor programs so that the Program Locator database is updated on a continuous basis. This essay shows that role.
This is a map that shows some of the places I try to connect and share ideas with others who have an interest in volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring programs. Here's the live map. Click on any of the links and you can join in places where I'm connecting.
The problem is, I can't find many on-line places where volunteers, leaders, researchers, donors, etc. are talking to each other and using maps and visualizations like on this blog to share ideas of how mentoring programs can help more kids through school and into careers.
I do web searches often to try to locate such groups. Today I did one and here's a couple of links I'll follow this week to try to make an introduction.
I wrote this article several years ago following a shooting that received front page media attention. I've repeated is a few times, most recently in July 2010. Since violence and murder are getting editorial attention again, I'd like to re-post it.
Once again a horrific act has moved violence to the front page of Chicago's Sun Times newspaper, with the headline "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH".
In the article Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis is quoted saying “So I say, enough is enough. We are coming for you. We will find you, and we will bring you to justice.”
The article also quotes St. Sabina’s pastor, the Rev. Michael Pfleger, who said "it’s not enough to pray, not enough to lower flags every time an officer is killed."
How many times must we read the same headlines? How do we move beyond the prayers, marches and flag-lowering, to the research, planning, brainstorming and action steps that are needed?
This is not a new problem. However, it's a problem that our leaders can't stay focused on every day, because there are so many other problems.
That's why I think it's important for another level of leaders to emerge, who are totally focused on building a better community understanding, and response, to the problems and solutions.
I've been issuing this invitation for the past 17 years, since we formed Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection, in the weeks following the shooting of Dantrell Davis in Chicago back in October 1992. I keep the front page of this Chicago SunTimes story in my office, as a reminder of my responsibility.
I've developed my own actions steps, and posted them on this blog in the past. Here they are again:
If we want to stop this violence, we have to act now, and keep acting to solve this problem for many years. We have to think spatially, that is, look at the entire city and suburban problem, not just one neighborhood. At the same time, we need to act locally, because none of us has the time, or the resources to help each of the kids in the entire Chicago region who live in neighborhoods where poverty is the root cause of the violence.
This animation was done by one of my interns after reading this article.
Here are some ways to remind yourself. Think of ENOUGH, is ENOUGH
E – educate yourself – most of us do not live in high poverty neighborhoods, so we only understand the root causes of senseless shootings from what we read in newspapers. We also only read negative news in the media, so we’re not really well informed on where these events are taking place most frequently. Finally, while there is a perception that there are plenty of youth programs, we really don’t have a good understanding of the distribution of different types of youth programs, to different age groups, in different zip codes. The only way this will change is if each of us pledges to spend one hour a week reading books, articles and web reports, that illustrate the root causes of these shootings, or of poor performance in schools. Through our learning we can draw ideas that we use in our own actions. We can also begin to contribute information that other people use to support their own decision making.
N – engage your network – find ways to draw others who you know into this shared understanding. Recognize people who volunteer time and talent, or who help kids through the programs they operate. If you are a business leader, or a church leader, engage your corporation or your congregation. You can use your web site, advertising, point of purchase materials, etc. to point to web sites that show all of the agencies in the city who do tutoring/mentoring, such as www.tutormentorexchange.net. If you do this weekly, year after year, your friends, coworkers and customers will become involved in solving this problem with you.
O – offer help, don’t wait to be asked. As you build your understanding of where poverty is most concentrated, and what social services are in those areas, choose a neighborhood, and reach out with offers of time, as a volunteer, talent, help build a web site, do the accounting, or offer Public relations services, and dollars, if the web site of an organization shows they do good work, you don’t need to ask for a proposal of how they would spend your donation, you need to send them a donation so they can keep doing that good work
U – build a shared understanding. Form groups of peers to share reading and learning assignments, just as you meet every Sunday to read passages of scripture and build the group’s understanding of the Word of God. Use the many different resources of the T/MC Links library as the starting point for your search for wisdom, and understanding.
G – give until it feels good – people who generously donate time and dollars to causes they believe in feel good about their giving. If we’re going surround kids living in poverty dominated neighborhoods with extra learning and adult mentoring networks, donors will need to give more than random contributions of time, dollars and talent.
H – form habits of learning, and pass these on to your kids. Imagine how much more successful teachers were if youth came to school every day asking questions about where to find information, or how to understand information they had researched on the Internet the previous day? We can model that habit if we build it into our own activity. Keep a chart where you can document actions you take each week to same sure that this time ENOUGH, really means ENOUGH.
If you document actions, you can review what you’ve done at the end of each month, and each year, and begin to see a growing mountain of actions you have taken to solve this problem. Some of these will be actions that got other people involved, so that the good work you do is multiplying because of the good work others are also doing.
Through this process you help build this shared understanding, which will lead to better public policy. Without this habit of learning, and without learning to use the Internet to find good ideas from people in all parts of the world, we won’t be able to problem solve as well as we need to, and we won’t be able to teach this habit to our kids.
If we do this, we’ll not only reduce the root causes of youth on youth violence, we’ll also address one of the growing issues facing America in a global economy. We will begin to create a nation of learners, problem solvers, creative thinkers and innovators, who use learning and information as the basis of creating opportunity and keeping America great.
I attended a Chicago Media & Youth Organization event this morning hosted by Community Media Workshop and Strengthening Chicago's Youth (SCY). The event introduced about 24 youth serving organizations, researchers and intermediaries like myself to about 100 youth and professional journalists.
This was sort of a speed dating thing where every five minutes I'd talk to two or three different people. I gave out business cards and hope some will visit this blog to get more information.
The newspapers are talking about murder in Chicago and the editorial writers are demanding new solutions and greater involvement from everyone. As I talked to the youth and professional journalist I encouraged them to think of ways the stories they write could pull potential volunteers and donors to their neighborhoods to support the constant improvement of youth tutoring, mentoring and learning organizations.
I've written a few essays in the past talking about ways young people can unleash their personal power, ways they can follow bad news media stories with "rest of the story" articles that draw attention to tutor/mentor programs (or the lack of them) in specific zip codes, and ways they can use the Program Locator to create their own neighborhood maps and include these in their stories.
Think of the power that might be unleashed if students from hundreds of high schools and colleges were doing this. Follow this logic.
The graphic below if from an essay I wrote showing how we need to expand the number of people using our information in order to influence growth and availability of volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring programs in more places.
I started the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1992 with the help of six other volunteers. By 1998 we had more than 80 pairs of teens and volunteers participating each year in the Cabrini Connections program. We had more than 200 people attending each of our May and November conferences. We had more than 12,000 people on our database and receiving our newsletters.
However we did not have a good way to show the growth of this network or show the diversity of its members. Over the past few years I've been looking at Social Network Analysis tools and articles showing the value of mapping and knowing your network. You can read some of these here.
I've been trying to harness this technology but have not had consistent volunteer or intern support and no financial support. Thus, it's been a slow process. However, over the past six weeks interns from IIT have made some progress.
Chul Wan Park learned to use Gephi.com software and did some maps showing the growth of the network on our Tutor/Mentor Connection forum from 2007 till 2012.
Since these maps are based on who is still in the network as of May 2012 they do not reflect people who may have joined but later left the group. However, this map shows three people in the group at the end of 2007.
This map shows that 58 additional people joined in 2008. The map below shows the network at the end of 2009. You can see that there are several people who have formed sub-networks within the forum.
The map below shows the network at the end of May 2012. By then there were 417 people in the group. You can see at least 9 sub groups within this map.
This forum is just one of the places I connect with people. Yet, imagine if 50 groups of students duplicated the network-building that I do over the next five years. If their networks grew at the same pace, they would be connecting more than 20,000 (50 x 400 = 20,000) people to stories they write about ways people in the Chicago region can help make tutor/mentor programs available in high poverty neighborhoods.
I use the graphic below to show that if we write about the same thing at key times each year, such as mobilizing volunteers to support tutor/mentor programs in August as school is getting set to start, or mobilizing donors in December before the year-end charity season, we can increase the flow of needed resources to every tutor/mentor program in the city, as long as every writer is pointing to the Program Locator directory that shows programs in all parts of the city.
If more people are looking at this information more young people and volunteers will take on other roles, such as the interns working with me, creating new ways to understand how our networks are growing and new ways to hold adults, business and political leaders accountable for what they do to help kids have the support they need to thrive in life.
This is not rocket science. It is advertising. It's what businesses do every day to draw customers to their stores. If youth and adult journalist can write stories talking about ways people can be involved in making programs available to help kids stay in school and move to jobs and careers, they can influence what others in business, entertainment politics and religion do.
If enough people do this we change the flow of resources and the availability of constantly improving programs in neighborhoods where too many kids are dropping out of school, affected by violence, and failing to reach their full potential. We do more to solve the problems that have plagued our city for decades. We do much to reduce the high costs of poverty which is a burden to all of us.
7-7-2024 update - Kumu.io is a network mapping tool. Here's a blog article showing how to map changes in a network over time. Here's an example of a community growing over time.
From my Facebook network I was pointed to a couple of articles on Crain's Chicago Business blogs.
Why should you be concerned with random violenceClick here.
Too many murders, not much clarity.Click here.
While the media attention on the recent rise in the murder rate now has reached a point where many are writing opinion pieces that show we all need to be involved in finding solutions, this is not a new problem. I've been writing articles about violence and poverty since I started this blog in 2005.
I’ve kept a copy of the front page from the October 15, 1992Chicago SunTimes in my office since the day 7 year old Dantrell Davis was killed as he walked to school. I re-post this in my blog at least once a year to remind me and others that the problem sill exist and the responsibility for all of us to be involved has not changed.
This is part of a library of news clippings, research articles, blogs, etc. that I’ve amassed over 35 years of leading a volunteer-based tutor/mentor program in Chicago.
Anyone in Chicago or the world can view this library.
One article in the Tutor/Mentor Connection library is points to a study by James Heckman, a Nobel-Prize winning economist at the University of Chicago and an expert on early childhood education. His research shows that many of the advantages children receive from preschool experiences begin to wane as they continue through school and that systematic interventions, such as additional tutoring and mentoring during their elementary and high school years, could sustain the early gains and build on them. Read more at: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-11/uoc-eet111306.php
While we have occasional flurries of public indignation, we don’t have an on-going Public Awareness and learning strategy that keeps people focused on this issue on an on-going basis, with the same degree of connection that we have with sports, reality TV, and consumer advertising.
As this article from 1994 shows, I’ve been trying to point consistent attention to this issue for almost 20 years.
If we can draw more daily attention to the research then we can also point on a daily basis to all of the organizations who are offering tutoring, mentoring and extra learning opportunities in different parts of the city. I’ve been hosting a database of tutor/mentor programs on-line since 1998 and have piloted a map-directory that visitors can use to understand the distribution of programs in different parts of the city (or the lack of programs in many of the high poverty areas). (2021 update: the directory is now an archive only. View map and list of Chicago area volunteer-based tutor and/or mentor programs at this link.)
People who are now concerned about violence can begin to use this information to think of ways they can use their own time, talent, dollars, technology, jobs, etc. in different sections of the city in a long-term process of helping build systems of support that combat the negative influences of poverty, gangs, drugs, etc.
There are many more articles concerned readers might look at and discuss with friends, co-workers, congregations, etc. See the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC library.
I was able to attend one day of the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, held in Chicago this week. As I've done in the past, my purpose was to connect with people and ideas that I could work with in the future to help make constantly-improving, mentor-rich non-school programs available in more high poverty neighborhoods.
I met a couple of people who I've connected with in the past, such as Chris Jarvis from Realized Worth, and Kelli Covey from the Project on Civic Reflection. I also ran into Scott Nierman, who I met while we both were with the Illinois Commission on Volunteering and Service between 2001 and 2009. I was also able to connect with Pia Simone from NobleHour, who was the only company to be a sponsor for the last Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference in Chicago.
However, I think I met more people by taking part in the Twitter chat that was going on during the conference and continues this week.
The organizers of the National Conference have done a great job of sharing materials. Here's a few * Video from Tuesday session on the Economy and Service
*Video from Tuesday session featuring Arne Duncan and Alberto M. Carvalho, Superintendent of Miami-Dade Schools
* List of workshops, bios, handouts from each session
I've used concept maps like this to try to connect people who attend different events focused on education, diversity, the drop-out crisis, etc. I keep adding to these maps, thus building the network of people who hopefully will connect with me and each other in the weeks between these events.
I've been working with interns to show changes in the network that grow over a period of years. If we can demonstrate the role of the person with the database who invites others to come together, or who serves as a network-builder, connecting one group with other groups, perhaps we can find more ways to fund this work.
I will be sharing these maps on Twitter and Facebook to open my network to others and to encourage others who attend and organize these events to build their own 'network maps' showing who they connected with and who they will be working with in coming months and years.
Post your link in the comments section if you do make such a map.
If focuses on the challenges volunteer-based organizations have in attracting busy people to volunteer and donate in the nation's social sector. The 1994 Chicago Tribune story shows that this has been my focus since creating the Tutor/Mentor Connection. Click here to see many stories created as a result of this strategy.
I'm in Chicago. My voice is small. My total budget for Tutor/Mentor Connection has never been larger than $150,000 in a single year. That does not include many dollars for advertising and public awareness.
Yet, I fully agree with Michelle Nunn. We must find ways to tell stories on a daily basis the same way advertisers promote fast food, financial services, Viagra, etc. To do this we need many people in business, schools, faith groups, etc. writing and sharing stories that mobilize volunteers and donors to support tutor/mentor programs in every part of the Chicago region where they are needed.
I've posted numerous articles to show how this might be done. Browse the leadership and collaboration sections of the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC.
Form a group and begin learning about these strategies and ways they can be adopted in your own organization. Visit this site to see how interns have been involved in this work for many years.
Anyone can adopt these ideas and provide as much leadership as they want. They don't need to tell me that they are doing this. However, if you appreciate the ideas and want to help me keep sharing this information, or do it even better, I'd appreciate your help, involvement and partnership. Read more.
Since July 2011 when I moved from a 501-c-3 structure to a LLC tax structure people who supported me in the past as volunteers and donors have struggled to continue to support me. I've struggled to find ways to ask for help, even though I can't do what I'm doing without the time, talent and dollars provided by a wide range of people.
Yesterday I attended a workshop at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service where the term "Service Enterprise" was introduced by an organization called Reimagining Service.
On their web site is this statement: We believe that one way to increase the impact of volunteering is to encourage the creation of more service enterprises. A service enterprise is a nonprofit or for-profit organization that fundamentally leverages volunteers and their skills to successfully deliver on the social mission of the organization.
I've described myself as a social entrepreneur, a social innovator, and a network-builder. Others have called me a "thought leader".
If it helps you to understand me as a Service Enterprise, then please use this definition as you read the articles on this blog and browse the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC.
In the Chicago SunTimes today was an article showing the cost of violence in Chicago to be more than $5 billion annually. You can find the study here.
If you want to help reduce this cost then become a volunteer, donor, partner of the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC and help me support the collective effort of hundreds of different organizations who are working to reduce the negative impacts of poverty by providing better non-school and school-based learning and mentoring support.
This graphic shows the type of platform for learning and collective effort that I've been building and need your support to continue. If we can make this work in Chicago we can share it with other cities. If you are from another city and help me develop this platform you can have it for your own city at a much lower cost than what it would take to build it from scratch.
I hosted another Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference in Chicago last Thursday. 70 people attended. I've been hosting these since May 1994. Space was donated by First Unitarian Church in Hyde Park. Help was provided by Becoming We the People and several volunteers. Money was provided by a sponsorship by NobleHour.
The photo is part of several taken at the conference by Mina Song, an intern from IIT and Korea. See the slide show here.
I've shared maps like these at every conference since 1995. They emphasize the need to support the growth and operations of mentor-rich programs in every poverty neighborhood. They also emphasize the need for leadership and accountability in business, religion, universities, politics so that more people are taking an on-going role of making constantly-improving programs available in more neighborhoods.
In addition to maps I've also shared newspaper stories that highlight why mentor-rich programs are needed and ways volunteers, donors, students and leaders can act every day to support the growth of these programs.
This week more than 4500 people are gathering in Chicago for the annual National Conference on Volunteering and Service. I'll be attending tomorrow. However, with so many people and so many workshops, there will be little opportunity to connect with all of the people who need to be involved in building infrastructure and marketing strategies that support tutor/mentor programs in Chicago and other cities.
I've been following Twitter comments using this link. http://tweetchat.com/room/NCVS
While were in the middle of June, my goal is to focus attention on what we might do in August to help mobilize more volunteers and what we might do in November to help raise visibility that increases year-end donations for all of the different programs operating in Chicago.
If teams of people in churches, businesses, political offices, schools, etc. would use this event chart to brainstorm ways they can use their time and talent to mobilize needed resources to support the growth of tutor/mentor programs, future conferences could become recognition events showcasing the best work done by organizations in each category.
I encourage you to spend time reading some of the articles posted here and that I've written in the past. If you use these to build your own leadership team and strategies we can be working collectively to make more programs available in the neighborhoods where highly concentrated poverty is a root cause of many social and educational problems.
The front page of today's Chicago Tribune featured a photo and story under the headline: Anti-violence program fails to save young Markham man. The story talked about the highly visible and very expensive Chicago Public Schools anti-violence mentoring program designed to target a small group of youth with high potential for being involved in gang violence.
For one youth, that was not enough to keep him from being gunned down in Chicago this week. The final line in the story is "He died with bullets in his head, chest and arm, and a mentor who keeps wondering what else he could have done."
In another section of today's Tribune, columnist Mary Schmich writes about Life in 2 Chicagos showing how most of Chicago area residents are safe from the violence that is a daily part of the lives of others in Chicago.
I've written about violence in Chicago in many past blog articles. I've included maps in my stories to try to focus attention on the need for a wide range of youth supports in these neighborhoods. I've created an interactive map/program locator that anyone can use to see the connection between poverty and poorly performing schools and to learn about volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring programs operating in different parts of the city.
This is not a new problem. However, we have never found a way to
a) bring enough people from all sectors into a learning and service process where we build empathy through our direct involvement and we build growing understanding through the on-going reading we do from libraries of research like the one I've been hosting for the last 15 years.
b)we've never found a way to keep this story in the media and in business publications on a daily basis the way fast food stores, banks and other retailers keep their products and services in front of potential customers. Without consistent advertising we can never get enough people and resources involved in all the places where concentrated, segregated poverty is the root-cause of the violence.
c) we've not found a way to make this issue important enough to business so that they would have teams of people working regularly to find ways to reach kids with volunteers, ideas, technology and jobs training programs that expand the social capital connecting youth in islands of poverty with the rest of Chicago and the opportunities these young people have in the future.
I said this is not a new problem.
This 1994 report titled Children, Families and Communities: A New Approach to Social Services, called for the creation of a system of primary supports that would reach kids before problems occur. It also called for a system of intermediaries to support the knowledge sharing and network building required.
I wonder how many people who have been mentors with Big Brothers or any other tutor/mentor program in Chicago over the last 18 years have been encouraged to read this or to think of ways they could do more to help the kids they mentor than just raise money for their own non profit, or than just spend time with a kids for a few hours a week and a couple of years?
Michael Porter, a Professor at Harvard University understands that the philanthropy model does not have enough money to fund all social problem solving. Instead, he feels that "Companies must take the lead in bringing business and society back together." He describes the "principle of shared value, which involves creating economic value in a way that also creates value for society by addressing its needs and challenges."
How many volunteers who come from the business community are reading articles like this or visiting forums like this and starting conversations in their companies aimed at creating new business models that "re-imagine and re-engineer" the support systems that reach kids in high poverty with programs, services and mentoring that helps young people learn to become CEOs of their own futures even before they enter middle school?
When the Chicago Tribune puts a story on the front page and devotes another full page to the story it is investing nearly a half million dollars in printed space and message distribution. It is potentially reaching more than a half million volunteers, innovators, investors, etc.
Few non profits have millions of dollars for advertising and few public service campaigns have this type of daily impact. We need to innovate new ways to bring people together and create the advertising, team building and communications systems that support this.
If we want to solve the problems we face we need to invest in long-term learning, innovation, complex thinking and problem solving. We need to create platforms that bring thousands of people together on a regular basis and that distribute the time, talent and resources of these people to many places where help is needed.
I'm hosting a conference tomorrow at First Unitarian Church in Hyde Park and welcome your attendance. I doubt that many who attend are thinking of Shared Value or have read the 1994 report, but through this my on-going efforts I keep trying to bring more people to this information.
Few of us can meet face to face. Many of us can meet on-line. Let's connect.
I encourage you to read this CBS News story where the Chicago Police Department Superintendent says the Crime Crisis is "not going to be solved overnight".
I've been posting stories for many years saying that we need a comprehensive, long-term strategy where leaders from many sectors are involved.
And, I've been hosting a networking conference every six months since 1994, inviting leaders from non-profits, philanthropy, schools, business and faith groups to attend.
I'm hosting another networking event this Thursday, June 14 at First Unitarian Church in Hyde Park. It may be a small crowd since so many other things are going on. But by hosting the event I'm able to draw attention to tutoring/mentoring in email, web sites, blogs, twitter, etc. and hopefully point more people to the ideas I and others share on our web sites, and hopefully build interaction in on-line forums where more of us might connect.
There's still time to register (click here). The Police, Hospitals, even the Mayor's office are welcome to send representatives.
I've received a number of awards recognizing the work I've done over the past 40 years, starting with an Army Commendation Medal that I received in 1971 as I finished my tour in Korea.
You can see a list of awards and recognitions received here and a list of newspaper stories here. One was the Publisher's Clearing House Good as Gold award that was presented on the Montel TV Show.
None of these awards was earned by my efforts alone. Many people have volunteered time, talent and dollars to help me build and lead tutor/mentor programs at Montgomery Ward between 1994 and 2011. This has always been a team effort.
One recognition I appreciate the most came from this article written in 2009 by Phil Shapiro. Another was receiving an honorary PhD from Illinois Wesleyan University in 2001.
Of course, the best award is hearing alumni tell how much their lives have been transformed because of being part of a tutor/mentor program.
I'd like to see thousand of people earning all sorts of awards for what they do to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs reach k-12 youth in high poverty neighborhoods of Chicago and other cities. That's why I write these articles every week.
How to use this blog: Each article includes graphics. Click on them to get enlarged versions. Each article has many links (which are often broken on older articles). Open the links to dig deeper in the ideas and strategies I share. On the left side are tags which you can click to find articles that focus on the same topic.
Note: the PO Box address shown w many graphics no longer is active.
Learn more about me at http://www.tutormentorexchange.net/dan-bassill.
I combine 17 years of retail advertising, 3 years in Army Intelligence and 40 years of leading site-based tutor/mentor programs, the Tutor/Mentor Connection and the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. Few people in the US have a similar depth of involvement and experiences.
I describe my work as information-based problem solving and host a library of my own ideas plus links to more than 2000 other sites which people can use to build and sustain volunteer-based non-school tutor, mentor and learning programs in high poverty areas.
You meet me in Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or other links shown below.
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