Connect with other out-of-school-time leaders

 Below is a map on the Georgia Statewide Afterschool Network website. 

This looks like a great resource.  I follow them on Twitter (X).  They post information regularly.

They are one of several afterschool resources that I share on this page of the Tutor/Mentor library.  The Georgia Afterschool Network is also listed on this 50 State Afterschool Network page, which is also on my list.

I also point to websites that aggregate youth program information on this page.  The map below shows one of the organizations on that list. It's the MyChi.MyFuture. Programs map which shows youth serving programs in Chicago.  

If these two pages don't provide enough information on out-of-school-time programs, you can also look at individual programs that I show on this page, and this page. 

And, if you visit this section you'll find dozens of research articles.

From 1994 to 2015 I hosted May and November leadership and networking conferences to try to get representatives of these organizations to connect, network, share ideas and find ways they could work together to overcome obstacles.  I used the website to share links to all of these organizations, even if they did not attend the conferences. I also included them on printed newsletters sent from 1994 to 2003 and email newsletters sent monthly since then.  You can see the conference goals on this page. 

These are still my goals.

As we enter a new school year, and the final months of 2025, programs serving youth in the non-school  hours, or focused on youth in high poverty areas, or with special needs, are struggling to find consistent resources. That struggle is magnified by how much attention traditional and social media are focusing on the actions of the current US government, and many states.

More than ever we need to aggregate information, and find ways to draw people to it, help them understand it, then help them apply it in many different places where kids and families need extra help.

In several past articles I've talked about "mapping participation" to learn "who's there" and "who's missing".  I saw a post on LinkedIn today from KUMU that showed how their platform can be used to do network analysis.

Note how when you click on each node you get information about that person, or what network he/she is part of.  Similar maps could show all the information in my library, or in libraries hosted by other people.

It would be great if someone were able to create a tool that would look at different sections of my library and created network maps showing who is visiting.  It would be even better if we had places where a large portion of the ecosystem (including media, funders, policy makers, families, youth, business, etc.) were engaged on on-going learning and planning that leads to more and better youth serving programs in all the places where they are most needed.

Until that happens I'll keep trying to keep the links in the library updated and will continue to point to this resources in my blog articles and my own social media posts.

If you've found any of this useful, let me know.  You can find links to my social media platforms on this page.

If you'd like to contribute to help pay the bills, visit this page. 

What issues unite us?

The political and cultural issues of the United States are creating growing political divides, and growing "hate" and "distrust" of others. Political violence is creeping in.  I'm seeing more and more signs that we're losing our traditional democracy and gaining a narrow focused dictatorship.

I've used this blog since 2005 and my print and email newsletters since 1993 to focus attention on libraries where people can spend time learning about these issues and finding ways to connect with others who are trying to find a better way.

I use concept maps, like the one below to try to guide people to different sections of my library, which has links to more than 2000 external websites, with their own extensive libraries.

And, I've created visual essays, like this one, to show actions anyone can take to draw attention to the issues and causes that they care about.  Borrow what works for you. Teach it to others.

Unleash Your Personal Power to Make Change Happen by Daniel F. Bassill on Scribd

My own focus for the past 50 years has been to help youth who live in areas of concentrated, persistent poverty, get the extra, on-going support they need to move through school and into adult lives, with jobs and careers that enable them to raise their own kids free of poverty.

I use visualizations like the one below to illustrate this goal.

The photo at the upper left is from the mid 1990s and the photo at the lower right is when one of those young women came back in 2010 to speak at our year-end graduation.  We're all now connected on Facebook and I'm seeing stories of their own kids finishing high school and college.

The graphic shown below emphasizes the need for long-term programs in high poverty areas of Chicago. If donors recognized this value, and the long-term support needed, my hope is that they would fund on-going general operations of programs who build such support for kids into their core strategies.  A map should show such programs reaching k-12 kids in every high poverty area, not just a few places.

In the lower left corner of this graphic is a  map of the Chicago area, with areas of persistent poverty highlighted.  Since 2005 I've posted more than 280 articles using maps to focus attention on specific areas of Chicago.  I highlight a few in this collection.

In this article I included this map of the United States, showing cities with high concentrations of poverty.  

The dark areas are metros. The orange area within each metro indicates an area of concentrated poverty.  Each of these cities should have a research intermediary that borrows strategies piloted since 1993 by the Tutor/Mentor Connection, who collects and reports information that everyone else in that city can use to supply the resources needed to reach a higher percent of kids in high poverty areas with well-organized, mentor-rich, non-school tutor, mentor and learning programs.

In another article I show a dashboard created by the Economic Innovation Group (EIG) that shows areas of the United States where economic prosperity is more prevalent, and where distressed communities are located.  Below is one view of that dashboard.

Here is a second view, this time centering on the Chicago region, where I've worked for the past 30 years to help volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs grow.

This map shows that there are many places in the Chicago region and Northwest Indiana that have distressed communities. So do other cities surrounding Lake Michigan, such as Milwaukee and Kenosha, Wisconsin, Waukegan, Illinois, Benton Harbor and cities further East.

If you zoom out, you'll find places all over the country with areas of persistent poverty and/or where economic opportunity is low.

This means people from every one of these cities and states should be talking to each other.  Where is that happening?

So, what's your cause?  Saving democracy? The planet? People in distressed situations?  If someone is building a library like mine, it can be a resource used by anyone, anywhere, to find information about complex issues and ideas for trying to solve those problems.  The blue box in the graphic below illustrates the role of such libraries. 

As I wrote above, the Tutor/Mentor library has more than 2000 links to external websites. Many of those have extensive libraries on their own site.  Each resource I point to represents one, or dozens, of people who work with that organization.  Imagine finding web platforms where people from all of these organizations were connecting regularly to share ideas, build networks and relationship, and create blueprints that show what's needed, and in what sequence, to solve the problem they focus on.

This concept map is an example of a blueprint that could be used in every metro shown on the map above.  In every high poverty zip code all of the supports shown on this map, for each age group, need to be available.  Building the blueprint and getting support for it are two huge challenges.

I wonder if anyone has created a concept map like this showing steps that would reduce the growing conflicts dividing this country.  I'd love to see it.

Thanks for reading.  I'm sure there are hundreds, if not thousands, of organizations building libraries and trying to draw viewers to their sites and events.  When I learn about these, I add them to my own library.

For instance, I added the SocialRoots website today. Check it out. 

I encourage them to dig into my blog articles and library and then include these in their own libraries. 

Then, reach out and connect with me on one or more of the social media platforms that I share on this page. 

If you value what I'm sharing and can help, please visit this page and make a contribution to help fund my work. 

Tipping Point Articles - add Vu Le to your reading

Several years ago, I posted an article featuring this graphic to show what universities could be doing to build a pipeline of new leaders into the youth development program sector as staff and leaders, and as people who proactively support such programs with their time, talent and dollars.

If this were happening, it would be a Tipping Point.

Today I read a new blog article by Vu Le, titled "Donor engagement and the retail-ification of equity and justice".  Everything he says resonates with my own experiences.

I have a link to his blog in a sub-section of the Tutor/Mentor library that focuses on "Challenges Facing NPOs".  

His articles, and the rest of the resources I point to should be part of any curriculum developed as a Tipping Point for reimagining how nonprofit and social benefit organizations are funded.

I hope you'll read these and share them in your networks.

NOTE. While my goal is to create a pipeline of new leaders, and new donors, for tutor, mentor, youth development and workforce development programs that reach K-12 youth in every high poverty zip code, this same model could be adopted to fix America's broken education system, and the widening gap between rich and poor, white and colored, urban and rural.  It's a long term strategy but needs a beginning.

Neighborhood Economics - Chicago 2025

Below is a view of the home page for the Neighborhood Economics - Chicago2025 event, which will be held from September 29 through October 1. It's described as a "convergence of visionaries, doers, and funders working at the intersections of capital, faith, entrepreneurship, climate, health, and real estate."

This will be hosted at Venue SIX10, at 610 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL, 60605. The registration fee is pretty steep, but scholarships are available.  See the schedule here. 

I connected with this group on LinkedIn through some network weaving discussions and I've been included in a Google Discussion Group that will run from early September (live now) through late October.  Kevin Doyle Jones is the event organizer. Visit his LinkedIn page and join the discussion.

The on-line group has been sharing introductions and inviting deeper discussions.  One example is this article titled, "The Power of Community Capital: Turning Local Dollars Into Local Impact", by Bill Huston, of Crowd-Max Publishing. 

Bill's article describes ways that "dollars raised in a community stay in that community, invested in local housing, small business and infrastructure."  He mentioned two crowdfunding sites. One was Wefunder. Another was Small Change, a real estate investing platform.  I encourage you to read the full article and do a web search to learn more about these, and other emerging platforms.  And dig through Bill's website to see all of the information he shares about crowdfunding.

This is just one resource that's been shared on the Google group in the past two weeks. I suspect there will be many more.  

I have written many articles over the past 20 years, focusing on the role hospitals could be taking to reduce inequality, improve public schools, lower health care costs and draw more young people into health care careers. Here's one article. Find others by clicking the #publichealth tag at the left.

In many of these I'm pointing to articles and research written by others to support my efforts to motivate hospital leaders to take on a broader set of goals (and to invite me into their conversations).

In this 2017 article I pointed an article titled The Often Overlooked Solution to Income Inequality, which shows that hospitals, as the major employer in many inner city neighborhoods, could take on a much broader set of goals "to help make cities truly livable".

In that article I shared a strategy plan template that was started by a team of DePaul University grad students in 2001. I've updated it a few times since then.

Tutor/Mentor Hospital Connection: A Vision by Daniel F. Bassill on Scribd

Here's another article, titled "Supporting Growth of Tutor/Mentor Programs around Mt. Sinai Hospital in Chicago", posted in 2008, with a map of the area surrounding Mt. Sinai Hospital, which is near Douglas Park. The map covers an area that is about 3/4 mile to the West, 1 mile to the North, 1 mile to the East and 1/2 mile to the South. Part of this area is in North Lawndale and part is in Lower West Side. You can see from the color coding that the area has high levels of poverty in this area. It also has several poorly performing schools.


The map shows that St. Anthony  Hospital and Schwab Rehab Hospital are also in the area. I'm not sure  how much this map overlays the focus area of the Neighborhood Economics conference, but it illustrates how I've used maps like this since 1994 to show where kids and families need help, and organizations in those areas who are trying to help, like tutor/mentor programs, but need help themselves.  

In my maps I've added layers for "assets" or businesses, hospitals, universities and faith groups who operate in or near the focus area, and thus should be more deeply involved in helping the community. Buy building a list of tutor/mentor programs in different parts of Chicago I enable the type of "crowdfunding" Bill has described, but not just for start-ups, but for on-going operations, too.

Below is an article I posted in 2019, sharing another article written in 2006. The topic of "Profit for a Purpose" relates directly to the goals of the Neighborhood Economics conference.

Here's one more article that I invite you to read. I wrote it in 2014. Its title is "CrowdFunding Tutor/Mentor Orgs in Chicago - Hive Chicago model".  

In this article I show a vision that I've had since the mid 2000s of creating a crowdfunding site that would draw donors/investors to volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs in Chicago. 

I concluded by saying:

Crowd funding sites that raise money for non profits AND for profits who are working to help improve the world are a step in the right direction.

I describe what I'm trying to build on this wiki page. By sharing this I realize I'm enabling others to borrow (steal) my ideas and move ahead of me on doing this work. I sure this would not be the first time. However, as the people in the Hive Chicago meeting said, this problem is too big for any one of us to solve. If my ideas inspire others to do work that needs to be done, I'll go to my grave a poor man, but knowing I've helped make the world a better place.

These articles show  how I've been interested in finding ways to support nonprofit tutor, mentor and learning programs for a long time.  During the 2000s I was able to find funding and volunteers to build interactive portals to do this work, but since 2011 I've not had the organizational structure or support to make these ideas a reality (or to even keep what was built in the 2000s still available in 2025).

However, if anyone wants to provide talent and/or dollars to help me do this work, I'm looking forward to hearing from you. This link shows social media pages where you can connect with me.

I hope many who attend the Neighborhood Economics conference in person will actively engage in the Google group, and that the discussions and idea-sharing will continue well beyond October 2025.

If you're involved in this type of work, please share an introduction and a link in the comment section of this blog. 

Dig deeper into the ideas shared on this blog

Below is a graphic that compares the process of helping youth from birth-to-work to building a huge building. Both take a long time and a lot of money.

Below is another graphic that visualizes the thinking involved in building and sustaining youth-serving programs that are needed in every high poverty area for many years.

After the 2024 US election, I posted an article showing the many challenges that face the United States. Unfortunately, it seems that the current President and his followers are making some of these issues worse, not better.    View the map here.

I think many of the topics on my map are issues that need to be addressed, if not by the Federal government, then by state and local governments.  

These are complex problems. If you look at the two graphics I started this article with, you might understand why I call on leaders to create visual blueprints that show the depth of each problem, and to connect people who are trying to solve each problem in different places with each other and with resource providers.  

Engineers and construction workers use blueprints because they show ALL of the work that needs to be done, in the sequence it should happen.

They also draw from a huge body of knowledge and experience, that many learn over 4 to 8 years of formal post high school college or vocational training and many years of continuing learning. 

Each symbol on a blueprint represents a specific skill and/or action and a library of knowledge that is hosted in a variety of places.  Such libraries need to be available for each of the topics shown on my concept map.  Without applying this thinking to solving complex problems, progress is slow, if at all.  A lot of money gets spent, but without lasting impact, and without reaching many (most) of the places where help is needed.

I've been writing about this for a long time. Before I started this blog in 2005 I was sharing these ideas in print and e-mail newsletters and in visual essays posted at www.tutormentorexchange.net

I've posted some paragraphs from past blog articles that I hope someone in every city and state will will take time to read.  These are ideas I've been sharing since the 1990s.  Too few have ever seen them. Too few have adopted them. 

You can click the image to enlarge and read the graphic. Then I hope you'll use the link provided at go to the article. Read it. Think about it. Share it.

open link

open link

open link

open link

open link

I've only highlighted five articles.  I've written more than 2300 since 2005. Many have the same ideas and the same focus.  

In many of my articles I emphasize a use of maps to show where people need help, and to assure an even distribution of resources to EVERY area where help is needed, not just to the most visible or the most well connected.   Here's one example. 

open link

While I've addressed this article to the people who are in power in Washington, DC, these ideas are for leaders in every city and state, both in the private and the public sector.  

Building interconnected web libraries that make "all that is known" available and easier to understand and apply, then an on-going public education campaign that teaches people to visit this information and use it to innovate solutions to complex problems, is a path forward. 

The big challenge is that too few have the resources, or motivation, to build such libraries and keep them updated for 20-30 years like I have.  This is an ideal project for universities to be doing, using a constant flow of student talent to collect and share the resources, then to use them during their alumni years.  

In 2009 a Northwestern University Public Service Fellow, who spent a year working at my organization, created this concept map, showing all of the different parts of NU that could help a tutor/mentor program grow.  You can see it and read his article at this link.

Unfortunately, after one year the writer moved on to other things, and no one at NU took ownership of his ideas.  If an updated map exists, I'm not aware of it.  

Most universities may be doing some of this work already. But most don't connect to libraries in other places, and other universities, in an interconnected web of knowledge.  That's what I feel should be happening. 

Maybe it is.  If you know of examples where this is being done, please share the link in the comment section. 

Thanks for reading, and sharing my article.  Please reach out and connect with me on social media platforms, like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Mastodon, BlueSky, Instagram, etc.  Find links on this page.

Finally, please consider a contribution to help me continue this work. Visit this page.

Create a New Tutor/Mentor Program Locator

With the help of others I created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1993, with the goal of helping volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs grow in every high poverty area of the Chicago region.  I've led it since 2011 through the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC.

We launched a survey in January 1994 to learn what programs were already operating in Chicago and I've tried to keep a current list of those programs available for the past 27 years.

While we published a printed directory from 1994 to 2002 we launched this on-line directory in 2004. It shows how we attempted to categorize programs by a) type of program; b) age group served; c) time of day service was provided; and d) location (zip code or community area).

The image above shows the search page of the Program Locator, which you can find at this link. The results of each search were shown on a Google map. Thus, searchers could see any tutor/mentor programs in a specific zip code of Chicago and find a website address they could use to go directly to each organization and learn more of what they do.

A map-based Program Locator was created in 2008, drawing from the same data.  You can view the archive at this link.  

Program Locator - 2008

This worked from a global perspective, showing the entire Chicago region and all of the tutor/mentor programs in our database, then enabled visitors to narrow their search by type of program, age group served, and location. It also included layers of information showing demographics, public school performance and assets (business, universities, hospitals, universities, faith groups) who shared the same geography and could be doing more to help programs grow.

While the Program Locator has not been updated since 2011, and some features do not work properly, it still is a template and model of the type of platform that is needed in every city. It was designed to provide decision support for community, business and philanthropic leaders while also helping parents, volunteers, educators, etc. find programs located in different parts of the Chicago region. 

View this concept map to learn more about the Program Locator. 

Their is a much wider range of youth-serving programs than just volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs.  Below is a graphic that you can find in this article. It calls for a segmented understanding of youth-serving programs. 

Over the past 15 years I've expanded the range of youth programs that I share in the Tutor/Mentor library, and if I had ever had the resources, I might have included a broader range of programs on my maps and in the searchable program locators. 

Over the past decade I've often wondered if anyone was using IRS 990 data to build a much more comprehensive understanding of existing tutor/mentor programs along with other types of your services. 

Today a LinkedIn post pointed me to this article, titled:  MapAgora, civic opportunity datasets for the study of American local politics and public policy.  

It's a detailed description of the process of building datasets that provide a comprehensive view of civic life across America.  The data they have collected  "illuminates where civic opportunities are available and which types of organizations provide them". 

The article says, "This entire pipeline is reproducible and relies on the two open-source R packages we developed: MapAgora (v0.08 https://github.com/snfagora/MapAgora) for parsing and integrating administrative data, and autotextclassifier (v0.05 https://github.com/snfagora/autotextclassifier/tree/main) for machine-learning-based text classification."

I did not see an maps showing this data, or anything like the Program Locator platforms we built in 2004 and 2008.  Yet, the data collection process is a blueprint for doing this and the datasets they built are available for anyone who might want to take this next step.

1-19-2026 update - Here are two links to efforts aimed at mapping the nonprofit ecosystem:

- Nonprofit Ecosystem Mapping - click here

- Project 990 - Building a comprehensive data analytics platform that integrates information from millions of tax filings, grants, and other sources related to philanthropic giving. click here

4-29-2026 - Chicago Social Impact Atlas, is a "free, searchable map of Chicago's nonprofits, funders and support organizations - built from IRS 990 filings and public data."  Most of the nonprofits shown have budgets of $250,000 or larger. click here

Do you know anyone doing this type of data collection/analysis?  Or drawing from this information to build platforms like the Program Locator? Or, anyone who wants to?  Please share the links.

Connect with me on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, BlueSky and/or Mastodon (see links here).

Thanks for reading.  I depend on contributions to help fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC.  Visit this page if you'd like to help. 

Learn about Tutor, Mentor and Learning Programs

Since 1993, when myself and a team of supporters, formed the Tutor/Mentor Connection, the goal has been to increase visibility for existing volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs in the Chicago region, so more volunteers, donors, media, parents, etc. will find and support them.

Below are posts found today on LinkedIn

Chicago Youth Programs, Inc. - website

Lawyers Lend-A-Hand to Youth - website

Tutoring Chicago - celebrating 60 years - website

These are just three of more than 100 volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs operating in Chicago, which you can find on lists hosted on this page.  

Visit the www.tutormentorexchange.net and in the HOT LINKS section on the left side of the home page you can see that I hosts lists of Chicago area programs with accounts on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.  I follow these programs on each platform, so in my feed I see what they are sharing. 

I encourage others to do the same.

Then write posts, or create videos, and share information about these organizations, to help increase visibility and support.  With so much public and social media focused on political issues and other man-made and natural disasters, these programs need more help than ever to find supporters.

I ask for your help in keeping these lists up-to-date. If you find broken links, programs no longer operating, or know of new programs that I should ask, share that information with me. You can find me on each of these platforms.  See links here.

These programs don't pay me to do what I do to help them (never have).  From 1993-2011 I operated as a 501-c-3 non-profit and asked donors to provide the money needed to build and share my lists, and to operate the single tutor/mentor program I led since founding it in late 1992. 

After going on the Internet in the late 1990s my lists have expanded to also point to other types of volunteer-based youth serving organizations in Chicago and to many others operating in other cities.  In my blog I constantly encourage others to build lists like mine to support all of the youth-serving programs within their own geographic area (urban, suburban, rural or reservation). 

Furthermore, the lists of programs is just one type of information I share.  

Below are two concept maps that show the progression of thinking I've gone through over the past 52 years, from when I first became a volunteer tutor/mentor working with one youth, to now, when I'm trying to help mentor-rich programs grow in all high poverty areas of the USA, and help those programs empower volunteers to take greater roles in reducing the inequality that persists in this country.

View the top cMap at this link.

This second graphic (click to enlarge) includes the concept map above, but shows  how we "start with one problem, but as we try to solve it, we're led to other questions and bigger problems".

I think there should be someone in every city and state with a library of visualizations that focus on the same issues and problems as mine.  That's because areas of persistent poverty are spread across the country.  If you know of such collections, please post a link in the comment section, or share it with me on social media.

Since July 2011 I've operated as Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC and have depended on a small group of donors to help pay the bills.  You can help if you visit this page. 

Follow me on Substack.com

I've not used Substack.com much in the past, but was prompted to post a new article this week after Paul Mondesire, a long-term friend who lives in New York City, followed the account I set up a couple of years ago. 

You can read the article at this link. 

I just posted this today and already I've had another long-term Chicago associate "subscribe".  I hope you'll do that, too.

The format is a bit different than you see here on my Blogger site.  Based on that, I've decided to post a few additional articles in the next few weeks, showing components of some of my concept maps and other graphics.  

I hope it helps more people find them and discover the ideas, then create their own versions to build support for youth serving programs in more places.

I've used printed and email newsletters, websites, blogs and face-to-face networking for the past 50 years to share reasons to support volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs and strategies to help programs constantly improve how they impact the lives of student and volunteers who get involved.  

Posting on Substack.com will add one more tool to this on-going effort.

Thanks for reading.  Follow me on Substack, and on other social media platforms (see links here). 

And, if you're able, visit this page and chip in to help fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC.

August 2025 Tutor/Mentor Newsletter

You can now view the August 2025 Tutor/Mentor newsletter, which will be sent via email tomorrow. 

Visit this page to read the newsletter on your computer or phone.  

The format will look different on a computer than on your phone.  It will also look different than what you received via email (if you are a subscriber).  

That's because the recent upgrade of the Joomla platform upon which the site was first built in the mid 2000s provides a different viewing experience on the PC vs the phone.  

However, it's also because I've not figured how to copy the newsletter from my Constant Contact, or email, onto a new Joomla page. I tried several time with last month's newsletter and it just looked terrible. So I ended up re-entering the newsletter data on a template that  had been created for my concept map pages. 

It works, but I'm sure someone with graphic design and Joomla expertise could do it better.  I just don't have any money to hire someone and in the past few years no volunteers have offered to help.

Take a look. Subscribe if you want this in your email.  Bookmark the page on my website and visit often. 

Enjoy your week! 

Mapping event participation

A few weeks ago I created the concept map shown below to help people find some of the articles I've posted about network building, network analysis, social capital, and community building.  

I included it in this March 2025 article titled, "Mapping ideas, information and networks".  

I follow the KUMU.IO account on LinkedIn and see regular updates where they share new projects. 

This week I saw one that really resonated with me.  It was a map showing participation in the February 2025 SOWTH conference.  The image below of one slide, shows how participation in the event expanded the network for many attendees. 

The SOWTH conference was a gathering in Atlanta, Georgia of more than 1,200 regional producers and food actors.  Over three days, the group "recommitted themselves to sowing a stronger, more sustainable agricultural movement across the U.S. South".  Visit this page and read Kumu's description of the project and find the link to the full Kumu Presentation. 

Another example of mapping participation is this KUMU map created for a Neighborhood Economics Conference held in Chicago in late September 2025. 

Since the mid 2000s I've been trying to develop tools that would visualize and map participation in Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences that I hosted every six months from May 1994 to May 2015, to demonstrate that they should receive financial support, and to convince others to use the same network analysis process in their own events.

In 2010 a graduate of DePaul University created some maps and blog-articles showing participation in 2008 and 2009 conferences. You can see her articles here.

In 2015 a team of students from different parts of the country adopted the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC as their client in an Information Visualization MOOC (#IVMOOC) hosted by Indiana University. Here's the final report from the work they were able to do in such a short period of time. On this page you can see how goals for this project were communicated.

I shared the data for the all 42 conferences with the IVMOOC team while at the same time inviting students/faculty from universities anywhere in the world to also work with this data. As the analysis of the 2008-09 conferences shows, you can look at this information in many different ways and create quite a few articles making sense of the visualizations.

The IVMOOC team looked at this data from a spatial perspective, using GIS mapping applications, as well as from a social network analysis perspective. This demonstrates a wide range of opportunities for future researchers and writers.

My goal is that as you do this you will convince others who host conferences and large gatherings that focus on poverty, race, inequality, workforce development, health disparities, etc. to apply these tools for their own events. Furthermore, instead of looking for organizers in Chicago, look for organizers in your own city.

Imagine a web site where maps like these from New York, London, LA, Houston, Paris and many other cities who struggle with these same issues are aggregated, so that people who attend different events in each city can easily connect with each other, or can connect with people and ideas from different cities.

While I've not made any progress since 2015 on mapping the events I hosted I've continued to share this idea via several blog articles which you can find here, here and here. You'll find many more in the network building, network analysis and networking collections. 

One idea I want to emphasize is that we need to use this data to not only know who participated, but who was missing.  The concept map below is included in this article.  

Planners need to use maps like this to determine what talents and networks need to be included in their events and conversations.  For instance, talking about building a new playground is good, but if donors and/or policy-makers are not in the conversation, it may be more difficult to find the money needed to pay for the project.  If participation maps don't show these people involved, then an effort needs to be targeted to enlist them.    I'm not sure if I've seen any examples of maps used this way. 

If you visit the resource section of the Tutor/Mentor library you'll find links to more than 2000 organizations and individuals.  Imagine having all of these people connected in active, on-going, learning and innovation networks aimed at helping kids from every high poverty area in the world move safely through school and into adult lives, with jobs and careers where they can raise their own kids free of poverty and systemic racism. 

Read this article and see the eLearning goals that I first posted in the early 2000s.  While I've not held the conferences since 2015 this is still my goal.

Now, Kumu and others are beginning to introduce me to a new generation of technologists, who are spending time collecting information and creating maps that share what they are learning.  I point to their work for the same reason I point to lists of Chicago and national youth serving organizations.  They can learn from each other. They can help each other.  And, they can share the work each is doing so more people find it and use it.

I encourage you to follow the Kumu "Project of the Week" posts on LinkedIn.  Visit their website and view the Gallery of Kumu projects.   And visit this section and this section of the Tutor/Mentor library where I point to many articles about concept mapping and visualization. 

My work with mapping was highlighted in this October 2015 Chicago Tribune article.   

I'd love to see dozens of future articles writing about how mapping event participation led to stronger, on-going networks, learning from each other and innovating solutions to the complex problems facing the U.S. and the world in 2025.

Thanks for reading. Please share this with your networks and connect with me on social media (see links here). 

And, if you're able, visit this page and make a contribution to my "Fund T/MI" campaign.