Blogs

I've been reading Curt Bonk's book titled the World is Open and have put in dozens of sticky notes on pages with links to on-line learning resources that he mentions.  I intended to go back and find these, one at a time, and add them to my own library on the Tutor/Mentor Connection site.

However, Curt's already done much of the work of building a list of resources. Visit this page and this page and you'll find resources that anyone can  use in their own teaching, mentoring, parenting and learning.

If you visit this page and begin to use some of the resources please post a comment to this blog sharing what you looked at and how you used it. Bonk's book focuses on "sharing" via the Internet. We can put the spirit of the book to work in our own efforts if many of those on the Tutor/Mentor Connection will share ways they are using the information he is sharing.

A few months ago I read this Civic Enterprises report, titled  Untapped Potential: Filling the Promise of Big Brothers Big Sisters and the Bigs and Littles they Represent.  If you're a current or former BIG, or have experienced the feelings outlined in this report from your involvement in a different mentoring program, I encourage you to read this report (PDF), and add your talent to our efforts.</p>

According to this report, "Youth who are part of the mentoring provided by Big Brothers, Big Sisters do benefit in a variety of ways, but many face "challenges of ruptured families and unsafe neighborhoods, bad influences from adults and peers in their lives, and schools marked by low expectations and insufficient student supports". These challenges are greater obstacles to successful youth development and movement to college and jobs than what a single mentor alone is able to overcome."

Many of the BIGs feel that their experience has motivated them to do more to mitigate these challenges. This report summarizes those feelings and suggests strategies that Biggs could take.  Many of our volunteers at Cabrini Connections experience the same feelings. I'm sure this is true in many other programs, too.

<b>As your read this, I encourage you to read the collaboration strategies on the http://www.tutormentorexchange.net site.</b> If you're one of those BIGs who wants to do more to help these kids, join with us in events aimed at building greater public awareness, better understanding of tutoring/mentoring strategies, and a greater flow of operating dollars and volunteers to all of the neighborhoods, and programs, where kids and volunteers can connect.

Here are some highlights of focus group discussions with more than 557 adult volunteers (Bigs) and 400 youth (Littles) :

Overall the "Big" experience profoundly changes the volunteer's perspectives on the lives of at-risk youth. More than four out of five BIGs (84%) said their experience has changed the way they look at
the challenges that at-risk youth face a great deal, or a fair amount.

Over half of the BIGss surveyed (56%) said they worry that their Littles are not getting the education they will need to support themselves as adults.

More than one out of three (37%) of BIGs said that not having enough to do after school was a barrier to their Littles' future success.

Seven out of 10 BIGs said that kids having more access to positive role models like coaches and teachers (73 percent) and role models like BIGs (69%) would improve childrens' chances for success a lot.

Four out of fiveBIGs *82%) said their experience as a BIG leaves them feeling like they wish they could do more to h elp their Littles and children like them.

Seven of 10 BIGs (69%) said that they would definitely or consider helping encourage more adults to help disadvantaged children in some way

Four out of five *82%) believe that BIGs working together can make a very significant or significant impact.

One BIG said, "Why go to the government.? This country isn't designed for that. It's about all of us volunteering and making it a better place."

More than 78% said that encouraging other individuals to become more involved in directly helping children was more important than working to change public policy.

<b>there were more than 245,000 active mentors involved with Big Brothers Big Sisters in 2009. </b> Think of how many have been involved over the past 30 years!

Imagine if just a small portion of these volunteers took on some of the leadership and organizing roles suggested in this report, or suggested in the Leadership and Collaboration strategies suggested by the Tutor/Mentor Connection.

It does not matter what city you live in. You can connect with each other, and with us, on this forum, or on forums you create. Let's put the potential of this report into action. Let's start now.

Visit http://www.tutormentorjam.org and support the Chicago volunteer recruitment efforts of the Tutor/Mentor Connection. Visit
http://www.tutormentorconference.org and take a lead at bringing Bigs and BBBS programs from all over the Midwest to the May or November Tutor/Mentor Conferences held in Chicago.

Visit http;//www.tutormentorpogramlocator.net and see how you can map locations of tutor/mentor programs in Chicago, or your own community, and use the maps as part of an outreach campaign intended to help more volunteers connect with kids in well-organized programs in Chicago and
throughout the country.

<b>Finaly, read the leadership ideas on the http://tutormentor.blogspot.com and enlist your business, college, faith group, professional group and/or hospital network as leaders and resource providers to this mobilization.</b>

Together mentors from many mentoring programs can do more to help inner-city kids have the support network they need to overcome the challenges of poverty. Let's connect in 2011 for the benefit of these kids.

These I-Open process maps provided by Betsey Merkel are very good. I'd like to hear from any members of this forum who are finding ways to integrate them in their efforts to build and sustain high quality tutor/mentor programs in one, or more locations.

Here is the process of ...culture building, one aspect of the I-Open Civic Forum Process http://www.flickr.com/phot os/iopen/4788169291/in/set -72157624482024386#/photos /iopen/4788169291/in/set-72157624482024386/lightbox/

Here is the timeline and repeating activities http://www.flickr.com/photos/iopen/5609058458/in/set-72157624482024386#/photos/iopen/5609058458/in/set-72157624482024386/lightbox/

Where are the philanthropic investors who would provide the money/manpower/talent for us to integrate some of these ideas in the Tutor/Mentor Connection?

In the groups and blogs on this forum you can see how interns working with me in Chicago are creating visualizations that communicate our ideas in new ways.

In this blog titled Design for Social Change the writer provides tips and reasons to use design to communicate ideas.

I hope members of the Tutor/Mentor Connection forum, not just my interns, will take a look and begin to find ways to communicate their vision, strategies, needs and ideas visually.

I created this graphic last week to illustrate the progression of thinking that I've followed for the past 20 years.

I know from my own experiences and those of others, and from much reading, that connecting youth with caring adults can have a positive impact.

I also know that building and sustaining these adult-youth connections in high poverty neighborhoods is very difficult without some organizational structure to enable youth and adults to meet in safe places and without supportive mentor-leaders in place to support weekly interactions. Thus, finding the existing volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in any city, and finding ways to help them get the ideas, talent, resources, volunteers needed to operate and constantly improve would seem to be a good idea.

Once we agree that organized programs are a good idea, then if we plot locations of existing programs on a map showing poverty and other indicators of youth needing extra adult support, we can quickly identify neighborhoods with few or no programs.  It would seem that leaders in business, media, politics, philanthropy and other sectors would want to work together to help existing programs grow and to help new programs grow in areas that are without programs.

Through the Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC) which I started in 1993, and the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC, which I formed in 2011, I'm trying to support all three levels of this thinking.   Browse the articles I've posted here, here, and here and in my blog to learn more about this thinking and to find ideas that you can apply to support these ideas in your own community.

In other articles I've pointed attention to the year-round strategy of the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC and Tutor/Mentor Connection and shown how the May and November conferences have helped to get stories in Chicago media.  I've now created a page on the web site where you can view and read many of these past view articles.

Imagine how many more articles might be written about tutoring/mentoring programs if the many members of this forum began to take an active part in the May and November conferences or the August/September Back-to-School volunteer recruitment campaign, encouraging media to tell the story from their perspective, and focusing on their program and city. 

The next conference is November 7, 2014 in Chicago and I don't encourage anyone from beyond the Midwest to try to attend.  If you're close and can do a workshop or be a participant, visit the web site and then register or submit a workshop proposal. If you are already planning to attend and/or host a workshop, then why not send a press release to your local media and see if you can generate a story showing why you do what you do and why networking and learning from peers is important.

If you'd like a copy of a handout we've created, just post a note and I'll send it to you.  If we can generate more news coverage on a regular basis we can also attract more volunteers and donors to support what we're all trying to do.