Edition

Edition: July 2013
Issue No. 122

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NOTE: throughout this newsletter we use a Tiny URL to shorten long web site addresses so the links do not break.

Issues of the month

* Mobilizing Support for 2013-14 School Year Volunteer Recruitment
* Connecting people, ideas, information and youth; Next Tutor/Mentor Conference
* Use data and maps
* President's Message - Building Learning Communities, Communities of Practice

issue 01
Mobilizing Support for 2013-14 School Year Volunteer Recruitment

As school starts in Chicago and other cities organizers of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs are busy recruiting volunteers and youth while also looking for financial support to help them operate through the coming year. Many programs have built long histories and connections between youth and volunteers that have lasted for many years. The goal of this newsletter is to share ideas that support the growth of such programs in every high poverty area of Chicago and which can be used in other cities at the same time.

Volunteer Recruitment is just the beginning. Year round support is needed to keep youth and volunteers engaged and bring them back a each year. At key times each year most tutor/mentor programs in a city are involved in similar activities. In August they are looking for volunteers. In November they are planning holiday fund raising campaigns. In January they celebrate National Mentoring Month. In February they are looking for replacements for volunteers to replace those who started in September but dropped out at the beginning of the new year. In May they are doing year end celebration, evaluation, and next-year planning.

Image created by Tutor/Mentor Connection

At these times each year, non profits, intermediaries, business and media could be focusing their messages on why and where tutor/mentor programs are needed. If links in these messages point to these search tools, everyone will have more resources to help them locate volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring programs in Chicago and other communities.

* MENTOR resources and referral service - http://www.mentoring.org/program_resources
* ServeIllinois - http://www.serve.illinois.gov/
* VolunteerMatch - http://www.volunteermatch.org
* Additional on-line volunteer search web sites http://tinyurl.com/TMI-Volunteer-Recruitment

In the Chicago region, use the Map-Based Tutor/Mentor Program Locator and Links library to help locate programs in specific zip codes. Our aim is to help programs grow and thrive in all parts of the region where they are needed.

* Chicago Program Links - http://tinyurl.com/ChiTM-Program-Links
* Chicago Map-Based Tutor/Mentor Program Locator - http://www.tutormentorprogramlocator.net

Image created by Tutor/Mentor Connection

Learn how to make your own maps to mobilize resources from assets in your own community area. This map shows where a 13 year-old boy was killed in Chicago. It can be used by organizers to build an understanding of how few tutor/mentor programs are in the area and how local hospitals, universities, businesses and faith groups might help build and sustain such programs. See this map being shared in this Tutor/Mentor Forum Discussion.

See how to make your own maps: http://tinyurl.com/TMILocator-how-to

Connecting people, ideas, information and youth - our goal since 1993

“Collective impact requires that funders support a long-term process of social change without identifying any particular solution in advance.”
This quote is from one of the articles about Collective Impact on the Stanford Social Innovation Review web site. . Click here to read the full article and others like it.

Image created by Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC

The Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC) was created in 1993 to collect and share information that anyone might use to support the growth of mentor-rich programs in high poverty neighborhoods that were working to help keep kids in school, keep them safe in non-school hours, and build networks of adult support that would help more move through school and into jobs and careers. Since being formed a huge library of information has been built on the internet which can be used by anyone who wants to help inner-city youth through school and into jobs and careers. The Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC was created in July 2011 to support this strategy in Chicago and help it grow in other cities.

The first conference was hosted in May 1994 to bring programs together to encourage relationship building, idea sharing and collaboration. Following conferences have been held every six months since then. This has been a grassroots affair made possible by all speakers volunteering time to share ideas. See maps and photos showing participation in past conferences.

20 YEARS/40 CONFERENCES: The next conference on November 4th will be the 40th Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference. If you've been part of these, or have been part of a tutor/mentor program that has participated, show your support with a sponsor contribution of $20, $40, $400 or $4000. Click here.

Speakers and workshop presenters now being recruited for Nov. 4 Conference at the Metcalfe Federal Building in Chicago. Use on-line form to submit proposal.

issue 02
Data and Maps can support planning and resource development

Image created by Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC

The maps above show how maps can be used to focus funding and volunteer resources into areas with high poverty, high number of shootings and concentrations of poorly performing schools. Read more about using maps on blog articles at http://mappingforjustice.blogspot.com and http://tutormentor.blogspot.com/search/label/maps .

Mapping Philanthropy
The Foundation Center has created a Philanthropy IN/Sight@ resource that uses interactive maps to show grant makers and grant recipients. Visit their web site to learn how to use this. Click here.

Dave Clark, Product Manager, Philanthropy In/Sight, a project of The Foundation Center, will be a speaker at the November 4 Tutor/Mentor Conference in Chicago. Executive Directors, Development Directors, Fund Raising Consultants and Philanthropy leaders should plan to attend and learn more about how to use this resource.

Image created by Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC

issue 03

president's message

Building a Learning Organization and Community of Practice
by Daniel F. Bassill

Every year from 1974 through 2010 I spent August and September recruiting volunteers and youth to be part of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs I led in Chicago. Many of the youth and volunteers were returning from the previous year. Some had been involved for several years. Many were new each year. Once they were recruited and matched, I then spent the next nine months trying to keep them involved. When I converted the original program at the Montgomery Ward headquarters in Chicago into a non profit I had to begin to learn how to raise the operating dollars needed to pay salaries and keep the program going. I also had to learn to recruit volunteers who served on the Board of Directors and had final decision on the vision and direction of the program.

As a result of those challenges, as well as my experiences developing retail advertising to support the 400 stores that Montgomery Ward operated throughout the country, I began to think of how volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs throughout the city might be supported the way retail stores were, with proactive efforts from corporations, foundations, city leaders, etc. who worked to assure that there was adequate talent, knowledge and operating resources available in each program to effectively connect youth and volunteers in a long-term effort to help the kids move from first grade through high school graduation and into jobs.

I began sharing my ideas in print newsletters in 1993, then on a web site in 1998. I started using blogs in 2005 and social media in the past few years. As I've shared my thinking I've recruited interns from a variety of colleges to create their own versions of these ideas. This animation was created by an intern to show the steps in this involvement strategy from this blog article.

Since 1998 I've created an extensive web library with information that anyone can use to support the growth of tutor/mentor programs and to support the learning and development of youth in these programs. This map is used to outline one section of the library. See maps like this here and here.

Every time I host a Tutor/Mentor Conference I invite representatives of these organizations to participate and use the conference space to further their own agendas. The next conference is November 4, 2013. If you're reading this I hope you'll help extend this invitation so more will participate.

If you've been part of one of these conferences in the past, or have benefited from a program that has participated, consider becoming a 40th Conference Sponsor.

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Thank you! You read to the bottom of the page. If you do this every month you are truly dedicated. I'd like to hear from you. Email me at tutormentor2@earthlink.net or join one of the forums I've pointed to.

Good luck to everyone as they launch a new school year of tutoring and mentoring.

Daniel F. Bassill, D.H.L
President
Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC
and Tutor/Mentor Connection

Read the blogs at :
http://tutormentor.blogspot.com
http://mappingforjustice.blogspot.com

Connect in these locations:
* on Twitter - http://twitter.com/tutormentorteam
* Linked in group on volunteering - http://tinyurl.com/TMC-LinkedIn-Volunteering
* Tutor/Mentor Institute on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/TutorMentorInstitute
* Tutor/Mentor Connection forum at http://tutormentorconnection.ning.com
* On Slide Share - http://www.slideshare.net/tutormentor
* On Scribd.com - http://www.scribd.com/daniel-f-bassill-7291
* On Pinterest - http://pinterest.com/tutormentor/

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