Visualizations can help create shared understanding

[Daniel Bassill]

On my blog at Tutor/Mentor Connection I post graphics like the one below, to help explain concepts that I feel would result in more resources for tutor/mentor programs, thus, more and better programs reaching more kids. The one below illustrates a goal of educating donors and volunteers so they are visiting forums like this, and our web sites, to learn what we do and decide who, and how, to help.

The chart below illustrates how this might be achieved, by recruiting volunteers from the workplace, and from beyond poverty, supporting them with constant coaching, and then educating them about the issues of poverty which are the reason the tutor/mentor programs is needed in the first place. Some of these volunteers can grow to become leaders who recruit other volunteers, donors, and business and political support. Read the blog article

Now imagine how lively this forum would be if each member was posting blog articles, and videos, with their own drawings and explanations of their own visions for building the type of support needed for many tutor/mentor programs to operate on every continent, with consistent support for all of them. As you struggle to visualize this, or as you ask the youth and volunteers in your programs to do this, the process of creating a diagram builds greater clarity of purpose to the people to take this step, not just for those who view the diagrams and stories. Give it a try. I look forward to looking at your own blueprints and strategies.