Complex Problems: Blog Articles written from 2005 through July 2012

7/31/2019 Complex Problems: Blog Articles written from 2005 through July 2012

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Use the blog to support your own groups discussions about poverty andways you can make a difference. Since early 2005 I have been using a blog as myown news commentary intended to draw attention to information and ideas that would leadto a richer system of supports helping youth in high poverty neighborhoods of Chicago andother cities move through K-12 public schools and into college or vocational school, then jobsand careers.

I feel some of the articles written in past years are just as relevant as those written today.Thus, Ive been looking for ways to call attention and point readers to these.

Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC Blog 2005-2012

What have I written about Complex Problems

This is Dan Bassill using maps to showwhere tutor/mentor programs areneeded in Chicago. Since 2005 Bassillhas written more than 1000 blogarticles to share the same ideas withreaders throughout the world.


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Friday, July 13, 2012Where do Mentors Learn?In Chicago there are probably 5,000 adult volunteers serving in organized tutoring and/or mentoring programs astutors, mentors, and on volunteer board. In the program locator database I show 172 organizations. I'm surethere are additional places where volunteers are connecting with kids, but I don't have that information.

There are more than 200,000 school age youth living in high poverty areas of Chicago. We need thousand morevolunteers in this system. Where are people going for data and ideas that could empower them to help programsgrow, 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?

Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC Blog 2005-2012

Follow these steps to find articles on the blog:

This is a screen shot fromthe home pagehttp://tutormentor.blogspot.com

Every article is labeled with keywords. These are listed on the leftside of the blog. Click on any ofthese and then scroll throughthose articles.

You can also search by year, monthand date to locate a specific article.Just scroll down the left side of the blogto find this section.

On the following pages every articleincludes the date written and title.


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Wednesday, June 13, 2012CPS Anti Violence Program Not EnoughThe front page of today's Chicago Tribunefeatured a photo and story under the headline: Anti-violence programfails to save young Markham man. The story talked about the highly visible and very expensive Chicago PublicSchools anti-violence mentoring program designed to target a small group of youth with high potential for beinginvolved 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 thestory is "He died with bullets in his head, chest and arm, and a mentor who keeps wondering what else he couldhave done.

I've written about violence in Chicago in many past blog articles. I've included maps in my stories to try to focusattention on the need for a wide range of youth supports in these neighborhoods. I've created an interactivemap/program locator that anyone can use to see the connection between poverty and poorly performing schoolsand 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 ourdirect involvement and we build growing understanding through the on-going reading we do from libraries ofresearch 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 wayfast food stores, banks and other retailers keep their products and services in front of potential customers. Withoutconsistent advertising we can never get enough people and resources involved in all the places whereconcentrated, segregated poverty is the root-cause of the violence.

c) we've not found a way to make this issue important enoughto business so that they would have teams of people workingregularly to find ways to reach kids with volunteers, ideas,technology and jobs training programs that expand the socialcapital connecting youth in islands of poverty with the rest ofChicago and the opportunities these young people have in thefuture.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012Poverty, Media, LeadershipMonday's Chicago Sun-Times devoted the firstthree pages to Mayor Emanuel's response tothe high murder rate in Chicago. On page 2 is a

full-page commentary by Mary Mitchell, underthe headline "We've heard this all before."

Yes, we have. I've posted this front page fromthe October 15, 1992 Chicago Sun-Times onthis blog at least once a year since 1995. Iincluded it in print newsletters I was sendingfrom 1994 to 2001 (while I stil l had money to dothis.)

Visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.comto read full article.


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Tuesday, June 05, 2012Become a middle-man in making change happen!

There is a mountain of research and articles available to help anyone build a PhD in understanding howconcentrated poverty in big cities contributes to the high social and economic costs of poverty.

However, there are not enough places where people are reading parts of this research every week anddiscussing it, in the same way faith groups read scripture and discuss it each week. Nor are there enoughleaders using maps and graphics to illustrate a need for resources to be distributed consistently in thousands ofplaces for many years in order to overcome the weight of poverty and help more kids move through school andinto "family sustaining" jobs and careers.

This concept map illustrates the many differentsupports all kids need as they grow up. Kids inpoverty areas have fewer of these supportsand in highly concentrated areas family andcommunity have less ability to bring thesesupports to their neighborhoods by their ownefforts and without help from others.Volunteers who become involved as mentors,tutors, coaches, etc. can become bridges, orsocial capital, that link the needs of thecommunity to resources and ideas beyond thedaily reach of community members and kids.

Thursday, June 07, 2012Applying Systems Thinking to Tutor/MentorI've used this graphic to show the range of skills/actions that need to be embedded into a tutor/mentor programin order for it to have a growing impact on the lives of kids, volunteers and communities.

This graphic includes a map, illustrating that greattutor/mentor programs are needed in many parts ofChicago. It also includes an inverted pyramid whichillustrates steps communities need to go through tobuild enough support and u understanding togenerate the resources that enable each program tohave the skills/talents shown in the above graphic.And it shows a need to connect people from beyondpoverty with the information being shared and withprograms in different high poverty neighborhoods

Wednesday, July 11, 2012Poverty, Media, LeadershipMy goal is that people who are outraged by the stories they see in the local news willform learning circles in their business, company, school and/or faith group and buildtheir own understanding of the program, and their own belief in strategies that connectkids in poverty neighborhoods with ideas and networks of people beyond their ownneighborhoods. Volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs can do this if they are

structured to encourage long-term connections of kids and volunteers and if they areavailable in the neighborhoods where their is the highest degree of poverty andsegregation.

Visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.com toread full article.


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Thursday, May 17, 2012NATO Summit - Work Behind the ScenesLeaders of NATO and aligned nations are in Chicago this week andwill try to reach agreement on some big decisions. Do you think theydo all the thinking, planning, brainstorming just while the leaders gettogether for a few days? I doubt it. I 'm certain that teams of peoplefrom each country have been meeting frequently throughout the yearto try to find solutions to tough problems.

With that being said, what sort of system connects the foundations,business leaders, policy makers, non profits, educators, and otherswho are trying to figure out ways to lower the costs of poverty andprepare more young people for roles in the global economy?

Monday, May 21, 2012The Future of Earth - Our Children. Is NATO talking about this? With the big NATO meeting in Chicago today,and the G-8 meeting in Washington last week, I was prompted to create this graphic to suggest a type of platformthat might connect those who are writing about bad news with those who are in the field leading organizations andschools that are trying to prepare youth to be the next generation of workers, along with CEOs and leaders, andthose who are in decision-making seats right now and control the flow and distribution of resources needed to payfor what we do to shape our future.

"how do we support all kids from the time they are born to thetime they are adults able to take care of themselves" which tome means they have a job so they can raise their own childrenwithout the challenges of highly segregated poverty and theknowledge of how to learn and work collectively with others asthey move through their adult lives, then the first question Ipropose is "what do we know of the problem and what do weknow of how others are already trying to solve this problem?"

If only one of the benefactors who paid for the NATO event, orwho is paying for the attack advertising and political campaignsof this election year were to devote some funds to building these

platforms and sustaining them for the next few election cycles,we might build a system where connected individuals worktogether to solve problems that governments have not figuredout how to solve.

Friday, May 25, 2012Connecting Grains of Sand into Castle on BeachIf you're just a grain of sand within a small sand castle you don't have muchgravity to pull all of the other grains together around your vision of the castle.Yet, if you write articles like this and post to Facebook, Twitter, and othersocial media on a daily basis like I do, you can draw some others together,

and that's a start. The goal is that the network grows over time and that morepeople take roles that help make the information easier to understand, thatincrease the number of people looking at it, and that motivate daily actions thatsupport individual youth serving organizations in many places.



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Thursday, April 12, 2012Increase in homicides. What is root cause?An increase in homicides in Chicago from 2011 to 2012 was the focus of a feature in today's Chicago Tribune.I've written about such stories often in the past, in an effort to mobilize more support for the growth ofvolunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in high poverty neighborhoods.

However, every time I read of a shooting, I wonder how connecting a mentor in the life of kids in thatneighborhood can have a direct impact on the current level of violence.

It causes me to ask, "what is the root cause" of this violence?

Friday, May 04, 2012Avengers, Leadership, Teams & IntrovertsIf you're interested in creativity, leadership, teamwork and/or collaboration I encourage you to read ChristopherBorrelli's review of the new "Avengers" movie in today's Chicago Tribune.

This reminded me of an article I saw a while back titled 'Want To Be A Leader? Learn To Be Alone WithYour Thoughts in which says William Deresiewicz, "Speaking to a plebe class at West Point, said that withoutsolitude, its hard to arrive at thoughts that are your own, and hard to develop the moral compass and moralcourage necessary to act on those thoughts."

In another article, I read about how it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert in any field. Thisblog writes about the book "Outliers", by Malcolm Gladwell, which "puts forth the premise that to be an expert in

your field requires a devotion to ones craft for at least 10,000 hours."

Most of what I'm thinking about relates to influencing the flow ofresources to non-school tutor/mentor programs in high povertyneighborhoods. Most of these ideas can be adopted to the sameproblem in other social sectors. If we can influence the flow ofresources and keep talent in programs longer, we increase theorganizational knowledge and the ability of each organization toconstantly improve their impact on kids and the volunteers whobecome part of these programs.

Thursday, May 10, 2012Mentoring, Workforce Development, CEO CommitmentYesterday I read a paper titled The Cyclical Process of Action Research which shows how groups of peopleare transformed as they work together to solve a problem.

This paper uses a hypothetical example of converting an industrial site into a community garden to illustrate it 'sideas. As I read this, I thought of how people working to make volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs available

to youth living in high poverty might go through the same process, with the same benefits.

Thus, if CEOs who adopt this ROLE OF LEADERS strategy and encourage the developmentof employee/community teams focus on a) making tutor/mentor programs more available; b)sustaining them for many years; so that c) youth from these programs not only finish highschool and go on to college and/or vocational education; d) many of them are supported by thenetwork of adults who they have connected with in earlier years as a result of the volunteer-involvement as tutors/mentors.



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Tuesday, April 03, 2012Mapping Global Environmental Crisis DiscussionI've written about the need for massive online learningcommunities to connect people interested in poverty,education, workforce development, racial justice, etc.with information and networks of people in an on-goinglearning process that leads to better understanding ofissues and more direct action by people, organizationsand governments.

I've also set up this discussion on Debategraph, thanksto the help provided by David Price, one of the co-owners. I feel there's a link between what I'm focusedon and what the environmentalist focus on because theability to learn and understand issues and developinnovative solutions is at the heart of any ability of aworld society to solve problems that cross borders andaffect people in all parts of the world.

http://debategraph.org/mentoring_kids_to_careers

Tuesday, April 10, 2012Longer School Day in Chicago?While the Mayor, the Chicago Teacher's Union, and parent groups debate the merits, costs and content of alonger school day, what library of information and ideas is available as a central resource for everyone learningabout ideas which could be applied to make what happens at school more transformative for kids?

Here's a video that was shared by friends in a Facebook group that focuses on education. It shows a strategybeing implemented in a suburb of Tel Aviv, Israel. http://youtu.be/6agzXa3vxKM

When the media do full page stories talking about one part of the education puzzle, readers should know where to

go to find more information related to this issue so they can build a more informed understanding of what is acomplex problem and requires a long-term solution and the involvement of many different sectors, not justteachers, students and parents.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012Navigating Information Overload - MOOCsOver the past year I've been learning about Massive open Online Courses (MOOCS). Rather than trying to give youa description of my own, I encourage you to view this video then visit this CHANGE.MOOC.CA site.http://youtu.be/eW3gMGqcZQc

Until we find ways to connect youth, volunteers,

leaders, donors and policy makers from each of thesedifferent organizations and from business, religion,philanthropy, higher education, government, media,etc. we'll never have consistent strategies reachingyoung people in all poverty neighborhoods with best-in-world strategies learned from this world of ideasthat can be found through the Internet.

Visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.com to

read full article.


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Thursday, March 01, 2012Is this a Utopian Vision?This graphic represents the range of learning, mentoring and social/emotional support that most kids needto go through school and into jobs. Based on the research and articles I've read over the past 35 years, kidsliving in high poverty areas don't have as many of these supports, so they have more challenges making itthrough school and into jobs and careers that enable them to raise their own kids outside of high poverty.

My dream is to help more groups begin to use theinformation I've aggregated, and which others havecreated, to learn more about poverty and how it challengeskids and schools, and to learn more about ways they andtheir companies, churches and universities could use time,talent and dollars to build and sustain long-term volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring and career-focused learningprograms in more places.

Saturday, March 03, 2012Re-circulating Good IdeasWe all want a better future for kids, but to reach our collective goal we need tobe working in strategic ways for many years, as this graphic suggests. At thebase of this chart is the work of collecting, organizing and sharinginformation that others can use.

Saturday, March 10, 2012Power of Connected NetworksBy creating these maps and putting links into my library I'm sharing what I learn every day with anyone whovisits my web sites or reads my blogs. Based on what I've read of knowledge management over the pastdecade, this is a value because it saves other people time in finding this information and helps them to see howone idea or network fits together with other ideas and networks as part of a larger collective effort to help kidsfrom poverty areas get the support each needs to move through school and into jobs.

Today, I was introduced by my Facebook network to anarticle titled "Knowledge and Praxis of Networks As aPolitical Process" written by Yannick Rumpala from theUniversity of Nice, in Nice, France.

In 17 pages Dr. Rumpala provided numerous reasons formapping and understanding networks, as part of an effortto achieve critical mass and POLITICAL influence. In onestatement he wrote "A reticular vision can be a way torethink the idea of citizenship."

As I read this I saw the potential of connecting with amuch larger network of thinkers and innovators who were

mapping ideas, networks and processes and making thisinformation available to support community and politicalinvolvement throughout the world.

Visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.com to read full article.


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Wednesday, January 18, 2012Steps toward collective actionI'm attending the National Mentor Summit next week in Washington, DC and on Monday January 30 I'll be co-hosting a panel discussion of Mentoring leaders from 7pm-8:30 at First Unitarian Church, Hyde Park, IL.

So how do we build on what takes place in these two events so we can influence the growth of mentor-richprograms in thousands of locations around the country and in the Chicago region?

We have a society that wants quick fixes to complex problems and with people who have too little time,commitment or discipline to spend time learning about problems and solutions on an on-going basis.

So how do we overcome this? Service Learning.

Sunday, January 29, 2012A connected worldAs long as we can imagine new solutions to old problems the possibilitiesof finding talent to help build these solutions are unlimited.

Saturday, February 04, 2012

Battle Plan for War on PovertyThe graphic below shows that the "pipeline to careers" is not working well enough to reach kids at an early age andprovide a wide range of mentoring and learning supports that would result in a larger number finishing high schooland post high school education and entering careers in STEM or any other avocation they choose.

A few years ago I created the graphic at the right, which illustrates the planning that would need to take place toenable more and better mentor-rich programs to be in neighborhoods where kids don't have an effective entry pointinto the "pipeline to careers" nor to that have enough effective supports along the way. As a result, we're losing kidsto street violence, bad health, poor nutrition, and lack of preparation for adult jobs and responsibilities.

I compare the planning process needed to support military forces in many places to that needed to maketutor/mentor programs available in many places.

Monday, February 06, 2012Where Good Ideas Come FromThank you to my Facebook friends for sharing this video with me. I encourage you all to take a look at it.http://youtu.be/NugRZGDbPFU



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Wednesday, September 14, 2011How did Edison do it?Imagine yourself 100 years ago listening to Thomas Edison talking about the need for an electricity industryand infrastructure to enable light bulbs to be in every home, street corner and business of the country.

Most people at that time did not know what a light bulb was. How many were thinking of transformers andpower plants and all the thousands of little details that add up to today's giant electricity industry.

I face the same challenge. Maybe you can help mecommunicate this better. To me the "light bulb" is atutor/mentor program. We still don't have a 100% provenmethod of connecting youth and volunteers in non-school neighborhood tutor/mentor programs of highpoverty neighborhoods in ways that result transformingthe life and future of the youth, and the volunteer. Weprobably have a hundred different definitions of what wemean when we say "transforming the life".

If you were Edison, how would you describe whatyou're doing and what you want others to do to helpyou?

Friday, December 02, 2011What Would Drucker say about "Evidence Based"?I've been following a few blogs on Innovation around the topic "Innovation is Messy". Here are a few that you can findon a Google Search

Innovation is Messy - "Innovation isnt a race. First isnt always best. Use the tools that are available right now andbuild on the work of others as necessary to improve incrementally."

Innovation Will Always Have Messy Parts: Wisdom from IDEO's David Kelley and 3M's Bill Coyne - "... one elementof the process is tougher for many people to accept than the rest -- that it is a messy and uncertain process andefforts to make the early messy stages more rational, safer, and generally neat and clean comforting get in the way ofthe process."

Spaghetti & Social Innovation: What should stick? "the emerging field of social innovation is like being in a kitchenwhere the recipe for social innovation is still uncertain and perhaps always will be. While there is definitely a case forarticulating core ingredients (e.g., novel solutions that tackle social problems in ways that significantly shift the waythe social problems are understood and managed), a wonderful part of social innovation is the openness to variety inhow that might be approached and organized.

I'm interested in this because my vision of volunteer-based tutoring/mentoring requires the involvement of volunteersfrom beyond poverty along with youth and families living in poverty who are constantly looking for better ways to buildyouth career aspirations and learning habits along with a network of adults who can help youth in high povertyneighborhoods move through school and into careers where they fulfill those aspirations.

Monday, December 12, 2011Connecting DropOut ResourcesI created the concept map below in October 2011 after attending the National Drop-Out Summit. I updated it today after attending another Drop-Out prevention event inChicago last week.


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Wednesday, June 08, 2011Chicago2011 Transformation - VisualizationI've been writing about Mayor Emanuel's Transformation plan in a series of articleshttp://tutormentor.blogspot.com/search/label/Chicago2011 Throughout the plan are statements like:

Chicago can only succeed as a city if every part of Chicago succeeds. And, Chicago wont move forward unless

we all work to move forward together. Success will be measured by asking whether all of our communities are

thriving.

So I've created this graphic to illustrate how the four parts of the Transformation plan are interconnected.

I've spent over 30 years thinking about some of the issues the new Mayor seeks to address. Thus, I'd like tobe able to contribute to the planning. The graphic below illustrates some of the ideas we offer.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Managing ComplexityAs we move from an industrial economy to an information economy we are dealing with much greater complexity.That's what this video is describing. Read about The Complexity Challenge.

In this article "Malcolm Gladwell says that if you want to shine, put in 10,000 hours." In the article above the authorsays "transform or don't survive". This is a critical issue for business leader. While I'm sure many companies arespending millions of dollars on training programs, learning these skills requires motivation and hands-onexperiences.My motivation to learn is driven by my passion for the cause. It's never been the paycheck.

If companies are looking for competitive advantage, or ways to survive in this new complex knowledgeeconomy, why not encourage employees to learn to manage complexity through the volunteer roles they take withsocial sector organizations who are using the most recent business technology to support the learning andinvolvement of staff and volunteers in their organizations.

Embed the Tutor/Mentor Institute in your organization and let us help you develop this strategy.



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Saturday, January 29, 2011Collaboration & Tower of Babel. Deep thinking.With the Internet we are now connected to people living in all parts of the world. With language translators availableon Google and other places we can now understand each others words.

Will this lead to future joint efforts to solve world problems? Is this possible?

Everything I've been trying to do through the Tutor/Mentor Connection and Cabrini Connections is get people tolearn from a common body of aggregated information and apply that understanding in efforts to make programs andservices available that help poor kids grow up better prepared for lives out of poverty.

Yet while the Internet gives us access to each other and an unlimited range of ideas, it also creates a proliferationof places with their own gravitational pull, making it more and more difficult to build the critical mass of peopleinvolved in any single place.

Is this just a continuation, or 21st Century version, of The Tower of Babel Story?

Sunday, February 13, 2011Using Social Media to Build NetworkI've used this picture before to illustrate how small and insignificant if feel as Ithink about how big the world is and how complex the problems are that we're alldealing with. I believed that the world changed dramatically with the Internet

because of the ways it enables people from different places to connect, shareideas, and as Egypt has just demonstrated, change government structures.

However, there are many challenges to overcome. This blog shows five majortechnology hurdles that need to be solved.

Monday, March 21, 2011Another War. Another Tsunami. Another Day.We've all heard the story of the "tortoise and the hare". The rabbit gets off to a fast start then runs out of gas. Thetortoise just keeps plodding along, passing the rabbit as it keeps on its own journey."

In my efforts to keep Cabrini Connections available to the 7th to 12th grade teenswho are part of the current program, as well as those students and volunteers whohave been part of Cabrini Connections in past years, I feel like the "tortoise". In myeffort to build a Tutor/Mentor Connection information-base and communications

strategy that helps tutoring and/or mentoring programs like Cabrini Connectionsget the resources the need to operate I feel like a very slow, very old tortoise.

However, the "hare" in this case is the on-going challenges we and other social-benefit organizations face from events we cannot control.

Friday, April 15, 2011Creative Messaging. Thought-Provoking.While I've just learned to create and post videos to share my ideas, I'm awed by how much talent and creativityother people are able to apply in sharing their own ideas. This video not only has some challenging thinking,

but demonstrates creative communications and visualization at its best.http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=qOP2V_np2c0#!



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Wednesday, December 08, 2010Collective Action - challenges and opportunitiesIn the current issue of Stanford Social Innovation Review,

www.ssireview.org/articles/entry/collective_impact/, Collective Impact authorsJohn Kania and Mark Kramer from FSG write that collective impact happenswhen a group of cross-sector actors commit to a common agenda for solving aspecific social problem and agree to each be accountable to a single overarchinggoal.

Successful collective impact initiatives involve a centralized infrastructure, a

dedicated staff, and a structured process that leads to a common agenda,shared measurement, continuous communication, and mutually reinforcing

activities among all participants, often organized and led by a 'backbone'organization.

Saturday, December 11, 2010What's your Vision?"Vision building is based on convergence, on bringing others onboard". This quote is from article from the HarvardBusiness Review titled Having Ideas Versus Having a Vision.http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/03/having_ideas_versus_having_a_vision.html

Keep this idea in mind as you read articles I post over the next few weeks.

Thursday, December 30, 2010The past. The future. The Money.

a) if you believe that connecting a youth and mentor/tutor volunteer is important (and the story above shows thatit is), then

b) you should accept that for these connections to be made linking innercity youth with workplace volunteers, structured organizations like CabriniConnections need to be in place close enough to where kids canparticipate regularly, and safe enough that volunteers and kids both will bewilling to attend on a consistent basis, supported with staff who mentoryouth and volunteers over the years that they are connected.

c) if you accept that organized programs are needed, you should be willingto support efforts that make such programs more available to youth in allpoverty neighborhoods of big cities like Chicago.

Tuesday, January 04, 2011Evidence that inequality leads to shorter life spans,I encourage you to read this New York Timesarticle by Nicholas Kristof which says "Theres growing evidence that

the toll of our stunning inequality is not just economic but also is a melancholy of the soul. The upshot appears tobe high rates of violent crime, high narcotics use, high teenage birthrates and even high rates of heart disease."

The maps we show on this blog and at Mapping for Justice, as well as the poverty and social capital articles wepoint to on the Tutor/Mentor Connection sites emphasize this point. They also are tools that people who don't live inpoverty can use to help create programs and services that bridge the gaps between rich an poor.



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Thursday, October 21, 2010Expanding Capacity - Partners NeededThe graphic below is one of many I've created and posted on this blog, to illustrate that our goal is to help kidsliving in high poverty neighborhoods have support systems, including non-school tutor/mentor programs, that

help them move to jobs and careers. In the complex problems tag you can find more than 70 articles.One of the most difficult problems we face is findingthe time to reflect and think about these problems, orto maintain quality information about all of theorganizations offering various forms oftutoring/mentoring in Chicago. This would be asignificant task for a larger organization.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Education Reform - Big QuestionWhich is more possible in the next decade?

Improving the level of teaching quality and effectiveness at every high poverty community classroomof every public school in America. Or....Creating a system of mentor-rich non-school supports that areavailable to at least 25% of youth in every poverty neighborhood, and which influence student aspirations,learning habits and motivation

Sunday, October 24, 2010Decentralized ThinkingInstead of trying to get millions of people in one room, to try tobuild a consensus, why not try to stimulate thousands ofdiscussions in many places, all drawing from a common body ofinformation and ideas?

Tuesday, November 02, 2010Non-Profit Starvation CycleHere's an article on the Stanford Social InnovationReview titled "Straight Talk in Mixed Company: A Plea for

Across-the-Aisle Conversations about Overhead Onestatement says "Explicit talk between nonprofits andfunders can sometimes be the rarest of commodities.

I encourage you to read the article and follow the linksand see if you can create a discussion circle with peoplefrom your own network. If we can't get the people whowant to help poor kids out of poverty with the peopledoing the work, and the people collecting information thatwe can all learn from, how can we use scarce resourceswisely?



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Sunday, December 27, 2009Obama supports Promise Zone. How in Chicago?

If you've been reading about Promise Zones, or inner city violence,or the state of Chicago Schools, and you are concerned about howthe next $30 million or so of public money will be spent, Iencourage you to take a look at our maps, and some of the articleswe're pointing to. There are many strategies that leaders can takeright now to make poor neighborhoods "neighborhoods of promise".There are many strategies that might cost millions, that may nevercome close to that goal.

Friday, February 12, 2010Race for the Top. T/MC 2.0

It's February. It's time to start thinking of the type of tutor/mentorprograms that will be available in Chicago and other cities in the2010-11 school year. With resources scarce, it's time for volunteer-based organizations to be thinking of how they convert currenttutors/mentors into leaders and capacity builders.

Friday, April 16, 2010What if Mom said "go find another home" ... when you were three.Imagine if your Mom had given birth to you, then one or two years later said, "I can't support you any longer. Gofind other parents."

That's pretty much how life is for non profits. For programs like Cabrini Connections working to "help teens growup" this is a huge challenge. We're constantly looking for new donors to replace old donors, or old donors to makelarger donations to cover increasing expenses. We don't have the advertising that big companies have, or the highprofile celebrity leaders that some charities have. We're not an earthquake, or a tsunami, which is such a largedisaster that it draws donors from around the world.

Sunday, May 09, 2010One small voice among a constellation of issuesThis image of the constellation reminds me of how many people are in the world, and how difficult it is

to attract just a few of them to read the ideas shared on this blog, and the links we point to.

Sunday, October 10, 2010Fixing Schools. Fixing Families. Long Term Goals Improving the learningopportunities and preparing more of our young people for 21st century jobs andcareers, especially those living in high poverty area, is a hugely complex problem,just like changing the social habits that have led to so many fatherless children.

Let's look at Superman and work toward changing the world, but let's also look at thesuper men and women who lead the non profits offering tutoring/mentoringprograms, and help them get the dollars and other resources each program needs tostay in the lives of the kids who already are part of these programs.



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Thursday, October 22, 2009Learn to use your network to build support your ideasWhile President Obama is calling for a mobilization of volunteers to solve problems in America, he's notyet showing how to build a network of support that would not only make a tutor/mentor program availablein a neighborhood with high poverty and poorly performing schools, but would help it be the very best inthe world at helping kids expand their networks, and use them to move successfully into schools, college,jobs and careers.

Friday, November 06, 2009Birth to Work Pipeline - White PaperOne of the papers I found as a result of attending the Nov. 4 Drop Out Prevention Summit was one titledEnsuring Workforce Skills of the Future: The Birth to Work Pipeline, written by Rick Stephens, Senior ExecutiveVice-President of The Boeing Company and Elane V. Scott, Leadership Strategist for Developing a CapableWorkforce.

The call to action says "It is vital that business, media,government, health, community and education leaderscome together and align their visions as never before.No one sector has the responsibility, capability orcapacity to operate alone."

This is what I've been writing about, and trying toachieve for the past 15 years. My voice is just awhisper in the wilderness. Hopefully some of thesebusiness leaders will read the articles on leadershipand strategy that I've written, and adopt some of theseideas in their own messages, for their own self

interests.

Saturday, November 07, 2009Building a Non-School StrategyOver the past few day's I've reviewed the handouts I received at the Nov. 4 Drop Out Prevention Summit in Illinois.

Most of the material I've looked at calls for a "school centered" strategy. However, the paper titled, EnsuringWorkforce Skills of the Future: The Birth to Work Pipeline, talks about the disconnect between educationstrategies and workforce development priorities.

One report Titled "Closing the Graduation Gap: Cities in Crisis" focuses onthe 50 largest cities in America where the size of the school agepopulation, and the size of the geography, makes the solutions morecomplex than what faces smaller communities.

In Chicago and these other cities we need business leadership strategiesthat focus on other channels than public schools for connecting kids withadults who help build aspirations, and motivations, that help keep them inschool, and point them at 21st century jobs and careers.

To read any article visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.comYou can search for each article by the date it was written.


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Friday, October 02, 2009Transforming Adults Involved In Volunteer-Based Tutor/Mentor ProgramsNow that Chicago won't host the Olympics, can we create "gold medal" thinking about ways to helpkids from poverty win their race to futures? Read on?

I attend many meetings where the problems and tragedies of poverty arediscussed. Almost all bring together many people with personal experienceand good ideas. However, a time in the meeting comes when we talk aboutfunding, and then we all recognize that this is a problem, then we go on andtalk more about the problems, and what we could do IF we had the money.

This chart shows a cycle that takes place almost every day, in hundreds oflocations throughout the country. However, it may be happening with lesspurpose and impact in most places, than is needed to change the flow ofresources to tutor/mentor programs.

Saturday, October 03, 2009Reverse the Funding StreamIn a recent post titled "Dare to think of big goals, solving big problems", Iposted our strategy map, challenging us to find ways to assure that all youthborn in poverty in 2010 were starting jobs and careers by age 25.

To do that, I feel we need to reverse the funding stream, which is what thediagram below seeks to communicate. I feel we do this by recruitingvolunteers from the business community, and beyond poverty, and empowerthem to be network-builders as they bond with kids and become morepersonally connected with the challenges inner city kids face that other kidsdon't.

Sunday, October 04, 2009Derrion Albert funeral: "No simple fix."It will take a huge effort, by faith leaders, business people and others to make comprehensive, volunteer-basedtutor/mentor programs available in hundreds of locations throughout Chicago, and to keep them in thoseneighborhoods for many years.

Isn't this the type of Olympic size vision that might unite the many diverse leaders in Chicago and it's suburbs?

Friday, October 16, 2009Value of Visual ThinkingI want to thank George Siemens for continuing toshare ideas through his blog and email newsletter.

You can see from this graphic, and those that youcan find by reading my past articles about complexproblems, that I'm a huge fan of visualizing ideas. Ifyou're a students, or an engineer working withautocad, or a designer, and want to volunteer yourtalent to help us communicate these ideas, pleasecontact us.



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Saturday, August 29, 2009Hope and Despair in the American CityHope and Despair in the American City: Why There Are No Bad Schools in Raleigh, by Gerald Grant, is abook that is being reviewed in a discussion on Fireside Learning.

The book "is a compelling study of urban social policy that combines field research and historical narrative inlucid and engaging prose. The result is an ambitious portraitsometimes disturbing, often inspiringof twocities that exemplify our nations greatest educational challenges, as well as a passionate exploration of thepotential for school reform that exists for our urban schools today."

Saturday, September 05, 2009Keeping T/MC a mostly FREE serviceI encourage you to read the analysis of the Tutor/Mentor Institute written by Bradley Troast, who is the 2009-10

NUPIP Fellow with Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection.http://cabrinipip.blogspot.com/2009/09/tutormentor-institute.html

This diagram describes the way we've been working. Rather than be in themiddle, charging a tariff for information to go back and forth between thosewho need help, and those who can provide it, we've moved from the middle toa third point in a triangle. Our information is intended to be used by donors,volunteers and public leaders, just as much as it is intended to be used bytutor/mentor program leaders, families, youth, social workers, etc.

Friday, September 18, 2009From Simplistic Thinking to Embracing ComplexityWe're in a war against poverty. But we're not using allthe tools and knowledge that is available to us to winthis war.

The T/MC does not seek to be the leader, witheveryone following us. We seek to be a platformsupporting the decentralized leadership andinvolvement of leaders throughout the Chicago region,the USA, and the world.

Monday, September 21, 2009Sept. 9 shooting - "kid you would wish for"Page 13 of today's Chicago SunTimesincludes a photo ofCorey McClaurin, a Simeon High School student, who wasshot last Saturday as he sat in his car. He was described as a"diligent, well-liked student."

This map shows where this shooting took place. It also showsthat there are a large number of poorly performing elementaryschools in the area, and no non-school tutor/mentor programsserving junior high or high school students operating nearSimeon High School or anywhere in this part of Chicago.


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Monday, June 15, 2009Corporate Teams using talent and timeI created this graphic to illustrate the work done behind the scenes at CabriniConnection, which leads to on-going connections of youth and volunteers inour program. There are dozens of things to focus on every day, and too fewpeople to do everything well.

In the Tutor/Mentor Connection strategy, I focus on actions by people inbusinesses, faith groups, politics, etc. that would lead to programs like CabriniConnections reaching k-12 youth in every high poverty neighborhood ofChicago, and every other big city in the country. That's an even largerchallenge than building and sustaining a single program in one neighborhood.

Thursday, June 25, 2009New Report on the Dropout CrisisOn the Front Lines of Schools: Perspectives of Teachers and Principals on the High School Dropout Problem.

By: John M. Bridgeland, John J. DiIulio, Jr. and Robert Balfanzhttp://www.servicelearning.org/library/resource/8724

Wednesday, August 19, 2009Troubled Schools, reforms tested againThis week the Chicago Tribuneis focusing front page and feature articles on public schools. Monday's featurewas, "Troubled Schools, reforms tested again" and shows that wave after wave of reform efforts often have

little impact. Charles Payne wrote about this in a book titled 'So much reform, so little change.

The map created by the Tutor/Mentor Connection reinforces this. There wereactually more schools added to the 2008 watch list than were removed from the2007 list.

So, what's missing?

None of these articles are talking about how we expand the range of non-schoolplaces where youth can connect with volunteer tutors, mentors, technology, artsand enrichment, and caring adults who act as extra family and expandedcommunity. This is a form of social capital referred to in research being done bythe Consortium on Chicago School Research, which was presented in a series

of discussions titled Is great teaching enough?

Tuesday, August 25, 2009What's Your Strategy for Helping Inner City Kids MoveThrough School and into Jobs?Every day we read something about violence, poverty,poorly performing schools, or about public officials notmeeting the high (or low) expectations we have for them.

How many of you spend time each week creating your ownblueprint for changing some of the problems we face? Thisgraphic is a strategy map that you can find on theTutor/Mentor Connection web site.



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Friday, December 12, 2008Combating Poverty through Place-Based InitiativesYesterday I attended a forum hosted by the Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago andthe Urban Institute. The title was "LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION: Combating Urban Poverty throughPlace-Based Initiatives.

Each speaker talked about how children living in places with high poverty facegreater disadvantages and challenges than do youth in more affluentsituations. Furthermore they all focused on the need for long-term solutions,and emphasized how difficult it is to evaluation community building efforts. Mr.Howard emphasized that donors and policy makers need to be thinking in 10to 20 year time frames, rather than in 2-3 year grant cycles.

While yesterdays event draws attention to new research and the problem ofpoverty, we need a comprehensive adult e-learning strategy, which engagesmore and more people in business, universities, philanthropy, non profits, andeducation with these programs. This village chart illustrates the many differentsectors who need to be sharing their ideas and connecting in communityproblem solving.

Monday, January 05, 2009Information visualization - use of mapsIf you've visited this blog more than a few times, you've seen me use mapsto illustrate where tutor/mentor programs are needed, and where volunteers,donors, leaders and business partners are needed to support long-termconnections of programs and volunteers with youth.

Here's an interesting article on information visualization that illustrates usesof maps and other visual tools to communicate ideas. This graphic is fromthis Infovis article: http://www.infovis.net/index.php?lang=2

Friday, February 27, 2009Creating Public Interest in Race, Poverty, Education issuesThe focus of today's symposium, and this year's Kids Count Forum is to go beyond traditional thinking to

innovate new ways to help kids get through school and into adult lives. A variety of panel members spoke. JudyErwin, of the Illinois Board of Higher Education, was part of the morning panel, and she said "we need to lookat a continuum of learning; we need to get out of our silos".

I agree.

Sunday, May 31, 2009Tutor/Mentor Conference shares ideas, builds networksOn Thursday and Friday about 120 people gathered in Chicago for the 31st Tutor/Mentor Leadership andNetworking Conference. Some were here for their second, third or fourth conference, such as Darryl Finch,from Milwaukee. Others, like a group of six faith leaders from Mississippi, were here for the first time.

On various blogs, and in the Tutor/Mentor Connection onNing, and the NUTutormentor on Ning, we'll try to summarizesome of what happened, and attempt to connect all of thesepeople, and others, so that over the next six months we cando more to help tutor/mentor programs grow and expand thesocial capital and learning opportunities for youth in highpoverty areas of Chicago, and other cities.


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Friday, July 25, 2008Focusing the Power of Faith CommunitiesI propose that we do some reflection, with small groups of people inchurches all over the Chicago region, building strategies that would use

the resources of that faith community (its members, its wealth, itsinfluence, etc.) to support the growth of comprehensive, volunteer-basedK-career tutor/mentor programs in high poverty neighborhoods of Chicagoand the suburbs.

Here's some maps to help with that planning.

The maps show the various stakeholders who could be working togetherto build a range of long-term, career focused tutor/mentor programs.When the marches lead to this type of thinking, planning and leadership,we can begin to see a light at the end of this terrible storm.

Thursday, September 25, 2008Save Money and Futures

Yesterday the lead editorial in the Chicago SunTimeswas "Save money and futures: Get dropouts into school."

Thus while I agree with the concern for the 25,000 youth who have dropped out, I urge the SunTimes and othersto advocate for a public and private sector funding strategy that supports kids from preschool to first job, with avariety of tutoring, mentoring, social emotional, arts and learning programs, available in non school hours andlocations, not just in schools.

Sunday, November 09, 2008What to do with $300 million donation.After the election of Barack Obama, perhaps the next biggest news in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago,was a $300 million donation to the University Chicago by a wealthy alum.

I read in today's Chicago TribuneBusiness Section that now that the University has the donation, "the hardpart" is to figure out how to use that $300 million donation. Not for me.

I'd use it to tap the assets of the University of Chicago, the University of Chicago Hospital and the surroundingbusinesses and churches and community-based organizations to build a world class network of non-schoolyouth and career development organizations in the high poverty areas within two miles around Hyde Park andthese institutions.

Wednesday, December 03, 2008Is Great Teaching Enough?

Bonding Social Capital is the connections made between people within the community to each other. Ithappens when people attend faith services, go bowling together, and through other group interactions. BridgingCapital is what connects youth and families within a community with people and experiences beyond theneighborhood.

In todays presentation Michael E. Woolley, M.S. S., Ph.D., University of Chicago, SSA. presented evidenceshowing that the more social capital and positive adults involved in the lives of inner city kids, the more likelythat they will do better in school.

To read any article visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.comYou can search for each article by the date it was written.


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Wednesday, July 02, 20088 year old shot. Tells docs: "When I die, I'm going to miss you."Last week was another violent week for Chicago kids. This time the story took a new twist. While in the hospitalthe boy said to his doctors, "You guys have been so nice to me. When I die, I'm going to miss you."

While there are only five non profits in this area, there aredozens of churches who could be places for tutor/mentorprograms to operate. We post maps like this so that faithleaders will begin to develop a strategic and long-termapproach to the violence and poverty that plague inner-cityneighborhoods.

Imagine if the Cardinal, or the head of the Baptistscongregations in the Chicago region developed an outreachaimed at increasing the number of church locations thathosted tutor/mentor programs, as well as the number ofchurch locations in the city and suburbs, who were supportingthese tutor/mentor programs with a regular communicationsstrategy that ties scripture to service, volunteerism andphilanthropy.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008Role of Engaged UniversitiesDuring the June 2008 National Conference on Volunteerism I heard former President Jimmy Carter say "We

have some of the best institutions of higher education in the world. Yet many of them are surrounded byslums."

Our aim is to share information so that teams in universities begin to develop their own ideal of what mix ofservices and what type of program structure is best, and that they begin to take on a responsibility for helpingsuch programs grow in the area around the university, with a goal that elementary school kids they work withtoday can be college freshmen in 6 to 12 years, and college alumni who support the university, and itsneighborhood tutor/mentor programs, 15 to 20 years from now.

The result of such leadership can be that instead of wealthy alumni donating $20 million for research at an areauniversity, these same alumni might begin to divide that money into annual grants of $40,000 to $80,000 thatwould provide operating support to volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in the area around the university,using the web site of the organization, and the recommendations of the university, to determine which groups

to support. It also means that thousands other donors will contribute their own time, talent and dollars tosupport the on-going efforts of programs in different parts of the city and suburbs.

Monday, July 21, 2008The $20,000 questionThe July 20, 2008 Chicago Tribunehad a front page feature asking what type of tutoring was the result of$20,000 grants provided to local groups in Chicago.

It's a good time to ask, "what do we mean when we say tutor/mentor program"? What do such programs look like?How can volunteers, donors, parents and/or media shop and compare?

My first advice to anyone is that if a program can't show what it is doing, why it does it, where and when itoperates, and how people can get involved, using a FREE blog, or some other FREE web space, I'd be cautiousabout investing in it unless it could show you some plan to use the money to build an effective program.



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Tuesday, June 10, 2008War on Poverty Requires Sophisticated Battle PlanI've often admired the genius of General George Marshall, thesupreme commander of US forces in World War Two. Withoutthe aid of a PC he and his team had to visualize a map of theentire world, know where the enemy was, and build a strategyto put US and Allied forces in all of these places so the warcould be won.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008Expanding the volunteer workforce - capacity buildingImagine if responsibility for resource generation moved out ofthe non profit sector and into intermediary organizations whowant to create positive public visibility, offer extra learning and

networking opportunities for high potential employees, andwill benefit from a resolution to the social issue beingaddressed.

Friday, June 13, 2008Each of us has a Civic Responsibility. MarketingSolutions.This chart illustrates how leaders -- who are not directlyinvolved in a single program -- can serve as anintermediary, connecting the people in their business, church,college, family, with the map, and thus with all of the differenttutoring/mentoring programs in the Chicago region.



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Tuesday, April 15, 2008Role of Leaders In an Internet WorldA while back I wrote about a CEO Summit that was

held in New York in February. Its goal was toencourage corporate volunteers to use their talent tohelp build non profit infrastructure.

My goal is that corporations begin to encouragepeople in their companies who have the skills shownon the Verizon Foundation Resource Page, to offertheir talent on an on-going basis, in causes thatrequire on-going application of time and talent to get aresult.

Tuesday, May 06, 2008Understanding Inner City Violence - article

For most of the people in America, inner city violence is just a sound byte on TV, or a newspaper headline. It'snot something they really understand, thus it's not something that offers more than simplistic solutions. It's acomplex problem.

I think we've got to find ways to apply multiple pressure points to this problem. No single solution is enough.

I think we've got to find ways to apply multiple pressure points to this problem. No single solution is enough.

Wednesday, May 07, 2008Engaging Student Talent to Solve Social ProblemsDuring the spring 2008 school year term, two students from anInformation Visualization class at the University of Indiana took on aproject for the Tutor/Mentor Connection. The goal was to visualize

the call to action that the T/MC is communicating via pdfpresentations so that it would resonate with leaders in businesses,universities, churches, who then would apply these ideas to helpingdraw needed resources to volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs inall high poverty neighborhoods of big cities like Chicago.

It shows how students in universities can use their talent, and theirlearning, to do real-world work that helps non profits achieve theirimportant social missions.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008Visualizing our goals for tutoring/mentoring, violenceprevention, education, etc.For many of us, the critical question at this juncture is how tocoalesce strategically around a unifying concept so that ourcombined efforts can break through the policy barrier that is

preventing an appropriate exploration of what must happen sothat all students truly have an equal opportunity to succeed atschool.


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Tuesday, December 04, 2007Follow the links.I've been building this blog for over two years now. I keep adding links to the left side of the page, to sites that Ivisit, which are entry points for vast areas of learning.

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

Thursday, January 24, 2008Complex problems require complex solutions

I think that as long as big city school systems only focus oneducation and school-centered solutions they will never get theoutcomes we all want.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008Stop the Violence around Crane. Is Police State Mentality the Answer?Today and yesterday the Chicago SunTimesfeatured two-page stories in response tothe shooting of one student near Crane High School, and the severe beatings of twoothers.

"Change doesn't just happen. It demands gifted and persistent leadership." There areno short term answers to this. Putting an army of police around this school won't solvethis problem. It's a band aid. And it won't address the same problem in the area around

many other big city public schools. See Solutions for America athttp://www.solutionsforamerica.org/

Saturday, March 22, 2008Easter is about HOPE. Here's what this means to me.Every faith has high holidays where people come together and celebrate. This is Easter weekend for the millionsof people who share the Christian Faith. It's a time for reflection for all of us, not just Christians. What do thesereligions, and these celebrations mean to us.

I think it's all about HOPE.

Friday, April 11, 2008Answers to Youth Violence - It Won't Be First TimePart of our problem is that we're working in silos, withbusiness people talking to each other, foundation peopletalking to each other, university people talking to each other,and none of us are crossing these groups to interact and learn

from others who are focused on same issues. There are waysto change this, using the Internet as a collaboration portal.


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Thursday, August 24, 2006Saving Futures, Saving Dollars: Converging ThinkingI've heard many people use the term "pipeline to careers", but not many map astrategy that identifies all of the different resources that are available to kids notliving in poverty, which need to be made available on an age appropriate,

continuous basis, to more of the kids who do live in poverty.

Brian Scales, from Mentors, Inc, based in Washington, DC, sent me an articletoday titled, Saving Futures, Saving Dollars. You can read it athttp://www.all4ed.org/publications/SavingFutures.pdf

This article illustrates the huge benefit to society if we'd just find more ways tohelp kids born in poverty be starting jobs and careers by age 25. We're remindedof this problem at least once a day in our local newspapers, either with a storyabout teens killing teens, or high school test scores. Yet, nothing seems tochange.

Friday, September 08, 2006

No Child Law near perfect? No way.Last week Education Secretary Margaret Spellings was quoted as saying the 2002 No Child Left Behind Lawwas "99.9" percent close to working properly and needed little change when it comes up for renewal next year.

That's not the opinion of many, including the Center for Mental Health in Schools at UCLA:http://tutormentor.blogspot.com/2006/07/learning-supports-needed-to-make-nclb.html

Friday, April 06, 2007Recipe for Success Whos in Your Kitchen?Are you developing a program to help kids in your community? Whats yourrecipe? Do you have all the right ingredients? Whos helping you? Who areyou learning from? Read on if youre concerned about the way your state ishelping poor kids in your community move through school and to jobs andcareers.

Wednesday, August 01, 2007Complex problems require complex solutionsI encourage you to read the article posted on the Smart Communities blog today. It says "We have bigproblems in this country and we need the free and creative thinking of foundations, government, and non-profits to help shape solutions. Read more at http://smartcommunities.typepad.com/suzanne/2007/08/what-worked-and.html

Thursday, October 25, 2007"Two Kids. Five Days. We're living in a crossfire."The front page story in today's Chicago SunTimeswas about the senseless shooting of two more Chicago kids.One was 10. One was 13. A quote with the front page headline reads "We are becoming veterans of doing this.Too many young people are dying for stupid reasons."

There is no simple, or short term, solution. Another march in the streets, and another headline in the paper,

won't change habits that have built up over many years, and many generations.

The only solution I know is a difficult, long road. It 's one of getting informed, and getting involved.


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Sunday, March 19, 2006Englewood: Less Marching + More Planning = Better ResultsThe reason nothing will change in Englewood is that too many people are marching and calling for truces andan end to the violence, and in front of the cameras, getting face time while the cameras are focused on thetragedy in Englewood. There's nothing wrong with that, except it just creates a flash of anger. Nothing issustained. There's no plan.

Too few people are in deep thought innovating ways to build and sustain a long-term movement. Too fewpeople are creating new ways to build involvement, ownership and public support from all parts of society,especially those who only read about poverty and tragedies like this in the paper. It will take a comprehensivevision, sustained over many years to change the conditions that make neighborhoods like Englewood feedinggrounds for gangs, drugs and random violence.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006So, What Do We Do About It?Over the past couple of weeks Ive written about the shootings in Englewood, and expressed my concern thatnothing will happen because there is no plan for engaging people from beyond poverty in this discussion in aprocess that creates ownership, understanding of the issues, and a dramatic increase the resources needed tobuild and sustain comprehensive tutor/mentor programs in poverty neighborhoods.

If we want more to reduce the violence in neighborhoods like Englewood, we must provide better education andcareer opportunities. To do this we must increase the range of non-school programs that help kids succeed inschool, stay safe in non-school hours, and move successfully to jobs and careers. The only time when workplace adults are consistently available to be involved in long-term mentoring is after 5pm, when most after-school programs are not open.

Finally, it takes years to build good tutor/mentor programs and it takes a dozen years just to help a youth gofrom first grade through high school. It takes another 6-8 years before that youth is anchored on a career path.

We can never support this process on a consistent basis in many locations if we cannot attract and keep keyleaders for existing programs, let alone attract thousands more for the additional programs needed in Chicagoand around the country.

We cannot do this without changing the funding paradigm.

Monday, May 01, 2006Innovation, Problem Solving, CollaborationThe research provided by Accenture and Compass Point provides information that non profits and for profits

could be using to innovate new ways to raise and distribute revenue, ideas, talent and technology to non profitsthroughout the world.

However, that is not likely to happen until these groups, and many others, connect with each other in on-lineportals where ideas are available for innovation, where on-line meeting and discussion capacity is available,and where someone provides a blueprint, and points to maps, showing all of the places where resources areneeded, and all of the existing non profits who are scurrying around like goldfish in a feeding bowl, trying to findfood for their operations.



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Monday, September 19, 2005Race and Poverty in America. Will We be Talking about This Six Months From Now?Why does it take a natural disaster to get us talking about how to help the disadvantaged in America? I readthrough several back issues of Time and Newsweek this weekend. There are all sorts of articles talking aboutRace and Poverty and how we don't focus on these issues other than in times like now. I've posted articles inthis blog before about the random coverage of this topic in Chicago's major papers.

Sunday, September 25, 2005I'm up to my neck in alligators. No time to drain the swamp.

Im sure this is a problem for other volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs, too. Thats why we created theTutor/Mentor Connection in 1993. We think its always been tough to find consistent funding. Thus, were tryingto create a more consistent public awareness that would draw more volunteers and donors to supporttutor/mentor programs in all parts of Chicago (and in other cities), not just our program. Were also working tohelp business and professional groups form leadership strategies where they use their own visibility andresources to draw volunteers and donors to tutor/mentor programs. The Chicago Bar Associations Lend A

Hand Program is the best example of this strategy. See http://www.lend-a-hand.net

Monday, November 21, 2005Changing NCLB standards abandons kids in povertyDid you see the article last week in the Chicago Tribuneabout changing No Child Left Behind (NCLB) to astandard that would measure student progress each year rather than demand that all students meet the samestandards?

Right now the Chicago Public School's education policy makes little strategic commitment to forming non-school learning, mentoring and social/emotional support systems that would counter the negative influences ofpoverty and send kids to school every-day better prepared to learn. If the system moves to adequate yearlyprocess there will be no motivation for school leaders to focus on what happens during the non-school hours.

Is this a concern? How are you using the Internet to connect with others who have similar concerns?

Wednesday, February 08, 2006"the difficulty of success does not relieve one of the obligation to try"Yesterday at the funeral of Corretta Scott King dozens of high profile people gave inspirational speeches callingfor service to this nation and this world.

I heard President Clinton while driving home. He said, "the difficulty of success does not relieve one of the

obligation to try"

That resonated with me. For the past 30 years I've been trying to connect volunteers and inner city kids in aprocess that transforms the lives of the adult and the youth. For the youth we're trying to show that there aremany career opportunities beyond those modeled in high poverty inner-city neighborhoods. They are availableto anyone who works hard enough and takes advantage of the support offered by volunteer based tutor/mentorprograms. To the volunteer's I've tried to teach concepts of service and leadership that go beyond "giving back"or "random acts of kindness". A youth in 5th grade needs volunteer support for many years and without thehelp of volunteers who become leaders and help improve the capacity of a tutor/mentor program, we'll nevermaintain our appeal long enough to ensure that our kids reach careers. Each year, this seems like animpossible task, yet, "the difficulty of success does not relieve me of the obligation to try."



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Monday, April 11, 2005Mentoring as a Workforce Development StrategyIn a Sunday, April 10, 2005 Chicago Tribune article titled "Workforce needs polish, U.S. businesses declare", thesecretary-treasurer of the New York State AFL-CIO was quoted as saying, "If we infuse education and job-trainingwith an emphasis on 'employability skil ls,' then we develop workers who not only can get jobs, they can keepthem as well."

Friday, April 22, 2005

eLearning and Collaboration ... Connecting the DotsIt's the final day of the Tech Soup forum on eLearning and Collaboration. I've enjoyed being a co-host. Manypeople have shared information ranging from experience in organizing on-line learning to experience infacilitating an on-line community to variations in technology available.

I posted my summary comments this morning, encouraging those who attended this week, and those who mightattend in future weeks to take the ideas and begin to work together to create the next generation of on-linecommunities.

My suggestion was sort of 'anti collaborative'. I said, take this fruit and plant it in your own back yard so it canmultiply. If we all wait for someone to take the lead, we'll be all waiting for a long time. Why? Because everyonein the Tech Soup forum (and in many similar forums) has a full time life responsibility that is not aligned to thegoals of most of the others in the same forum.

Saturday, May 07, 2005It Takes More Than Caring to Lift Hard-To-Reach KidsHere's a message written by Bonnie Bracey, at [email protected], that I feel is worth repeating:

Certain schools are having success in dealing with formerly low-performing students, writes William Raspberry. Butprecious few school systems are showing much consistent improvement in educating the children we know to behard to educate: children of low-income black and Hispanic households, children of single-parent school dropouts --children, in short, for whose parents school didn't work. What is hard for us to get our minds around is that schoolimprovement is fairly easy to accomplish for children whose parents were successful in school and are enjoyingsome success in their lives.

Friday, May 27, 2005Memorial Day: Just Don't ForgetThis weekend is going to provide a visible opportunity for those who are elected leaders, and those who wantto be elected leaders, to use the memory of those who died to preserve democracy to once again show whathypocrites they all are. Why do I believe this? Because while public figures and media honor those who foughtand died in traditional wars, few encourage this same degree of personal sacrifice in the war on poverty,racism, and inequality in America.

Random acts of kindness don't build a building and don't raise a child.

Change will only occur when people learn to get involved and stay involved, often repeating the same actionsover and over for many years.

Friday, September 02, 2005Disaster challenges all of usHowever, in six months or a year there will be another disaster that will mobilize public attention. Then thepeople who need Tsunami aid, and the people who need Katrina aid, will be off the front page and struggling tofind the dollars needed to continue rebuilding their communities.

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Complex Problems: Blog Articles written from 2005 through July 2012

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