Monday, March 18, 2024

Helping Tutor/Mentor Programs Grow - for over 30 years

 I've been digitizing my files so they will be available to more people, even after I end my time on this earth.  Last week I posted this article and pointed to an archive with letters and email correspondence that extends back to the 1990s and even earlier. 

Here's a 1998 article from the Southwest News-Herald, showing work I've done to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs grow in more places.

I met with Willie Iverson several times in 1997 and 1998 and encouraged him to adopt the Tutor/Mentor Connection strategy and Total Quality Mentoring idea to help programs grow in the Ashburn area of Chicago. This article is evidence that he made that attempt.

Here is another article from my archives. This is a letter I wrote for Streetwise in 2012. 

On this page, I've posted many of the news stories generated by Tutor/Mentor Connection strategies. Remember, our goal was to increase attention for volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs in Chicago, to help them attract a more consistent flow of operating dollars and volunteers.  This collection of media stories and letters of appreciation shows we were doing that.

I've found many more media stories that are not on this list and will be making them all available in my archive in a few weeks.  

And this is a note that I received from Minor Meyers, Jr, president of Illinois Wesleyan University.


President Meyers finished by saying he was sending my information to a Trustee in Detroit.  Minor was a huge supporter of my work from 1990 until he died around 2004.  I never was able to build similar support from other IWU President's who followed him.

Nor have I been able to build that level of trust and support from any other university, although my archives show many connections to local, national and international  universities over the past 30 years.

That's one of the sad challenges of doing this type of community building.  People who you've built trust relationships with and who are actively spreading news about your work to others, move to new places, or new jobs, or leave this mortal life for another.

That means intermediaries like myself are constantly rebuilding relationships and trust at organizations we've worked with for many years.  It's a reason why the Tutor/Mentor Connection strategy should be embedded in universities and endowed with long-term funding.

Maybe there's a billionaire out there willing to take that role.

Learn more.

The image below shows what you'll see if you open this link to my letters to DBassill file


These are PDF files containing multiple letters and/or email messages. You'll see many "thank you" messages. 

If you look at who I was communicating with you'll see a wide range of people.  As I've digitized these I've reached out on LinkedIn to re-connect with some who I met 20-25 years ago. Some I cannot find. Others have accepted an invitation to reconnect.

You'll find two more folders with correspondence between myself and others at this and this link. Maybe you'll know some of these people and will add them to your own network.

Imagine re-connecting with all of these people in on-going, online, information sharing portals aimed at filling areas of persistent poverty with mentor-rich community and school-based youth programs.   

In a recent article I've pointed to dashboards created by the Economic Innovation Group, which show areas of persistent poverty and areas with economically distressed communities.  On the MappingforJustice blog you can find many similar examples.

These point to places all over the country where comprehensive, mentor-rich programs are needed to help youth through school and into jobs and careers and where an information-based intermediary like the Tutor/Mentor Connection could be created, borrowing from lessons you can learn from my archives.

Imagine some day in the future, ten, or 15 years from now, being able to point to a similar collection of letters and files, showing people you've connected with and people you've helped.

That is my goal. It's why I share this information.


I will help you as long as I'm still able. Just reach out to me on one of these social media platforms and let's start a conversation. 

Read these articles about starting a new Tutor/Mentor Connection and these showing what I've been trying to do since forming the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC in 2011. 

Finally, to enable me to keep this information available I need some of you to visit this page and make contributions to help fund my work.

Thank you for reading.  I've been honored to be part of so many lives. I hope you will enjoy the same experience. 







Friday, March 15, 2024

Tutor/Mentor Connection needed in many places

I've been digitizing my files to further downsize and preserve my history. Hopefully someone(s) in the future will use these to teach new leaders to build information-based problem-solving intermediary organizations like the Tutor/Mentor Connection, which I launched in 1993, and which has been led by the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC since 2011.

This week I found this email, sent to me in 1999 by a community leader from a rural part of Washington State.  Click on the image to enlarge it and read it.


It starts by saying "I have been visiting your tutor/mentor website and am very impressed with what I see there."    That's the goal of the website and thousands of people have visited since the late 1990s.

Then she says, "I would like to see more of what your organization is doing, being done out here and within rural communities.  Even though the numbers of youth within rural communities are smaller, the issues are often similar.  The needs and barriers that youth and families face require "villages" of all types to rase a child."

She finishes by saying, "Thank you for your input, resources, ideas and time that you give to those of us who are on the Mott AfterSchool list serve. Your information is extremely valuable."

During conferences that I hosted every six months from May 1994 to May 2015 I've had others tell me of the need for something like the Tutor/Mentor Connection in rural areas.  I've also had similar conversations with people from Africa, South America and Europe.

I've encouraged all of them to duplicate the Tutor/Mentor Connection and build something like it in their area.

My goal is that in every place where there is persistent poverty there would be blogs and news reports showing someone holding a "Directory" listing youth programs in that region, and inviting volunteers, donors and business leaders to support them.  

I never found consistent donors, or high profile people to help me do that.  But if you read letters sent to me in the past, you'll see an appreciation for the Tutor/Mentor Connection.  That should motivate you and others to borrow my ideas and build T/MC type strategies in  your own community.

Here's one more reason.  

My friends at the UCLA Center included a link in their latest eMail, to this article, titled "The Soft Bigotry of High Expectations"  It starts by saying, "To combat the black-white school achievement gap, worry about their persistent segregation, don't hope for miracle teachers."

I've been putting links to articles like this in my library for over 20 years.  For instance, the graphic below was created in 2013. 


At the left, is a Chicago Tribune map showing shootings in 2013. In the middle is one showing areas where the Get In Chicago group was focusing their efforts. At the right is the Tutor/Mentor Connection map showing poorly performing schools from the 2006 Illinois schools on probation list.  The Tribune map, and T/MC map, both highlight areas of high poverty.

The graphic below shows similar maps, which I shared in Tutor/Mentor Conferences held in the 2000s. These also highlight areas of high poverty. 


Here's another graphic, using the three maps above, with a "birth-to-work" timeline.


This graphic emphasizes the long-term investment needed to help kids in high poverty areas move from "birth to work" and shows a goal of connecting youth in these neighborhoods with adults from a wide range of business, professional and educational backgrounds.

That is a strategy for building "bridging social capital" which expands the community assets supporting kids and helps them through school and into adult lives.

Read this article titled "Maps, Time and Social Capital" which I posted in 2022.  It's one of many in this collection that talks about expanding the "village" of support for kids living in areas of persistent poverty, which usually are also highly segregated. 


A couple of people recently expressed interest in helping me pass the Tutor/Mentor Connection and Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC on to others. As I've said in the past to other people, "Start reading my blog articles and browsing my website."

Then, start sharing what you read with others,  using your own social networks and creativity. Browse articles at the T/MC Intern blog to see how college students did this for 10 years.  

I think this is the hardest lesson. To duplicate my efforts you have to be willing to become an evangelist, to do all you can to spread the message and draw attention to the information hosted in web libraries like mine.  


Furthermore, you need to focus on drawing operating dollars, talent and ideas to every area with high poverty, and to every youth serving program in those areas.  You need to be committed to doing this for a decade or longer, then passing that commitment on to others, just as I am trying to do.


That's enough for today, don't you think?  

Thanks for reading.  Please connect with me on social media (see links here). 

Finally, if you value what I'm writing and want to help me continue, please visit this page and make a contribution to help Fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. 





Monday, March 11, 2024

So many years. So few changes.

Below is a concept map that I created several years ago to show planning that needs to be happening in Chicago and other places with high concentrations of persistent poverty.

Open the map and follow the links. Is this process happening in your city?  Do you have a similar concept map. Do you host open meetings on ZOOM or another platform? 

Today I read an article which I posted in March 2006, following shootings in the Englewood area of Chicago.  I'm re-posting it because the message then is still relevant now.

----- begin 2006 article -----

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve written about the shootings in Englewood, and expressed my concern that nothing will happen because there is no plan for engaging people from beyond poverty in this discussion in a process that creates ownership, understanding of the issues, and a dramatic increase the resources needed to build and sustain comprehensive tutor/mentor programs in poverty neighborhoods.

Yesterday, 3/21, I participated in an audio conference titled “Integrating Mentoring and After-School”, which focused on the need for mentoring programs in more places (like Englewood) and the potential for these programs being hosted in traditional after-school programs, such as Boys & Girls Clubs, YMCA’s, schools, etc. I encourage you to read the Policy Commentary at https://web.archive.org/web/20060324000257/http://www.forumfyi.org/files/ostpc11.pdf. In a few days you should be able to read a transcript of the actual audio conference.

Today, 3/22, I attended an event titled Non profit Leadership Challenges and Opportunities, which was hosted by the Donors Forum of Chicago 

Representatives from Compass Point, presented findings from a web survey that was distributed in eight cities over the past year. It’s titled “Daring to Lead, 2006” and you can download the full report at www.compasspoint.org.

The Daring to Lead presentation highlighted three surprising findings: a) 30% of executives leave their jobs involuntarily (either fired or forced out); b) Executive directors plan to leave their jobs but will stay active in the nonprofit sector; and c) A key driver of executive burnout is frustration with funders.

While the focus of the Donor’s Forum meeting was on succession planning, which is essential to leadership stability and organizational growth, the research constantly pointed to a lack of ACCESS TO CAPITAL as the primary challenge facing small and mid size non profits. Their was a rousing cheer when the need for funding non-restricted, long-term general operations funding was raised as a pivotal issue.

I agree. You cannot keep good leaders, or pay them well, or offer retirement, if you don’t have enough money to pay the rent on a regular basis. If you deal with this problem every day for 12 years, as I have, it tends to be a bit stressful.

How do these issues connect? If we want to do more to reduce the violence in neighborhoods like Englewood, we must provide better education and career opportunities. To do this we must increase the range of non-school programs that help kids succeed in school, stay safe in non-school hours, and move successfully to jobs and careers. The only time when work place 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 go from 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 key leaders for existing programs, let alone attract thousands more for the additional programs needed in Chicago and around the country.

We cannot do this without changing the funding paradigm.

So what do we do next?

There must have been over 500 people at the Donors Forum event. I don’t know how many were in the audio conference on Tuesday. However, most will never be in the same room, or the same discussion, at the same time again, because there was no strategy in evidence that gave participants and opportunity to connect with each other, and the presenters, in a facilitated, and open, on-going dialogs.

That’s why we created the Tutor/Mentor Connection. That’s why I invite anyone interested in tutoring/mentoring as a strategy for civic engagement and for increasing the understanding of poverty, to participate in the May and November Tutor/Mentor Leadership Conferences held in Chicago and on the Internet.

These are a meeting place for people to come together to present, reinforce, advocate and discuss information such as was presented over the last two days, in the context of the urgency that is reinforced by the media coverage of events like the shootings in Englewood.

Over the past two year’s we’ve also begun to develop a web conferencing process, so that people from distant locations can connect with people in Chicago, during the May and November conference periods, and so that people can stay connected on an on-going basis. As others host video and audio conferences, or face to face meetings such as today's event, my hope is that they will build web strategies that link the participants to each other, and to affinity groups such as the Tutor/Mentor Connection.

Our goal is to turn discussions into meetings, and meetings into a process of identifying tipping points, or ways to collaborate in activities, like leadership development, funding, volunteer recruitment, which effect all tutor/mentor programs in the country, not just our program in the Cabrini Green neighborhood of Chicago.
(note: if you're an architect, or work with complex decision support, we'd like to recruit you to map this process, to create a blueprint that people could follow to understand the problems and to be strategically involved in the solutions)

If you read back through the blogs I’ve posted in the past year, you’ll see that there have been many forums where information of importance was presented to a gathering of interested people.

I invite all of those who are creating and presenting research on poverty, workforce development, tutoring/mentoring, violence prevention, youth development, service learning, etc. to use the T/MC conferences and internet space as additional times and places where you can present your information, help more people understand it, and contribute to a long-term process that leads to the development of more and better programs that keep kids safe, successful in school and moving toward jobs and careers.

You can read about the conference at http://tutormentor.blogspot.com

---- end 2006 article -----

I've not hosted the Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference since 2015, but still maintain an extensive web library and list of volunteer-based, Chicago area youth tutor, mentor and learning programs. I still post articles weekly, and social media posts daily, to draw visitors to the information in the library.  I keep looking for places to connect.

I created this graphic a few years ago around St. Patrick's Day, which is this week.  It says "We CREATE our own LUCK with the help of others."   It points to the four concurrent strategies that should be part of any planning process, which I've piloted since 1993.

I have not had resources to effective lead this strategy for many years, but keep sharing the ideas to inspire others to use them, in their own leadership.  

I'm on most social media platforms. Let's connect. (see links here)

You can help improve my own luck with a small contribution to help Fund the T/MI.  Visit this page and use the PayPal service. 

Thank you for reading.   May the Forth be With YOU!





Monday, March 04, 2024

Be Like Terry. Share My Resources

I started participating in cMOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) around 2011 and connected with a group of educations in a #CLMOOC event in early 2013.  I've built relationships with several people in that group in the years since and pointed to them in stories I've posted on this blog. 

One of those is Terry Elliott, a retired college professor from Western Kentucky.  I did a search on his blog today for "tutormentor" and the image below shows the result. You can view that page here


I hope you'll read through the article Terry wrote. He offers his  own perspective on the work I've been doing.  That's the goal.  Each person has a different lived experience, based on where they live and what their life journey has been.  Each person has a different network of people they learn from and influence.

If we're going to do better at helping kids out of poverty and distressed conditions, we need many, many more people involved.




If you skim through the CLMOOC articles I've posted, you'll see that a few others have also mentioned my work often on their blogs.  I appreciate that. It's what I hope many will do.

Here's an article I posted in 2015, encouraging others to share my articles, and those of each other, in an on-going effort to build attention and draw resources to support tutor, mentor and learning programs that help kids in high poverty places move through school and into adult lives, with jobs and careers that enable them to raise their own kids free of poverty.

Thank you Terry and others who share these ideas.  




Wednesday, February 28, 2024

Opportunity for All? Involvement of More.

Last week I posted some maps created from an interactive dashboard built by the Economic Innovation Group (EIG) that enable you to zoom into different places in America to see, at the census tract level, where poverty persists.  

Today they released another dashboard, showing where economic prosperity is more prevalent, and where distressed communities are located.   The poverty rate is part of this index, but other factors are also included. Read about the DCI on this page

Below is one view of that dashboard.

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

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

To help you understand the data shown on this map, read some of the stories shared on the platform.  This one, titled "Economic inequality often divides neighboring communities", is especially relevant. It shows how communities, like the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, have a huge variation in economic well-being.  If you zoom into the Chicago region, or other big cities, you'll see the same pattern.

Since I began serving as a volunteer tutor/mentor in 1973 I've been building a library of articles to help me understand why tutor/mentor programs were needed and where. Over the past 25 years I've accelerated that information collection, building a wide range of articles about race, poverty, inequality and social justice.  

I use this concept map to point to the various sections of my library where I share these links.

When we formed the Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC) in 1993 our mission was   

"to gather and organize all that is known about successful non-school tutoring/mentoring programs and apply that knowledge to expand the availability and enhance the effectiveness of these services to children throughout the Chicago region."

 On the mission page of my website I show that

THIS IS A MARKETING PLAN INTENDED TO MAKE HIGH QUALITY, CONSTANTLY IMPROVING NON-SCHOOL TUTOR/MENTOR PROGRAMS AVAILABLE TO THOUSANDS OF YOUTH LIVING IN HIGH POVERTY NEIGHBORHOODS OF THE US AND THE WORLD

On the strategy page I show this concept map, outlining four concurrent strategies. 


I created this graphic many years ago to show the intermediary role the Tutor/Mentor Connection has taken since 1993 and that I've tried to continue via the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC since 2011.


The information I share can be used by anyone in any part of the country to help people living in distressed communities move toward economic prosperity. It can be used to understand our long history of racism and inequality and current threats to democracy and freedom.  It can be used to draw people from all sectors into conversations and learning that leads to problem solving and solutions.

Using the EIG map anyone can create a different version of my graphic, replacing the Chicago region with their own part of the country.  Anyone can build a library showing local issues and link to my library showing a broader range of information (and in my library I point to many websites which themselves are extensive libraries).

So why aren't more people involved solving these problems?  Maybe one reason is that too many people don't want them to be solved, for their own self interests or political/religious beliefs.

I'm sure a major reason is that there are so many other competing issues, and most people struggle with their own personal well-being and that of their own families.



Maybe another is that most people don't live in distressed areas. These are not their problems, or their daily lived experience.  The map views below illustrate this point.

This is a view of the EIG dashboard showing persistent poverty by census tract.

If you look at the map from this view, you can hardly see the persistent poverty areas around Lake Michigan or in Ohio.  You need to zoom in to see high poverty areas around Lake Michigan.


However, these are small islands in an ocean of opportunity.  Unless you live near, or in, one of the shaded areas on the map, this is not your lived experience. You only understand the problem from what you read in the news, or on social media, which is often a very biased point-of-view.

3-7-2024 update - Here's an article using the EIG dashboard to show patterns of neighborhood distress in US metros

The reason I support volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs is that they not only can offer life-changing opportunities for kids lucky enough to participate in an organized program, but they draw people from beyond poverty into a shared experience with kids and families who do live in these areas.

I created this concept map to show how volunteers who are well-supported, and stay involved for multiple years, begin to learn more about the challenges facing youth and families, and in some cases, become willing to do more to try to help remove those challenges. 

I did not have the library of information that I now host 49 years ago when I began leading a tutor/mentor program.  In fact, I did not begin to intentionally collect race-poverty information until the mid 1990s.  Initially, I focused on the benefits of being part of a tutor/mentor program as "diversity training".  

Here's an article from page 2 of my January-February 1997 T/MC Report newsletter report that shows how "One-on-one tutor/mentor programs offer the best diversity training program any company might invest in." (It's always embarrassing to find typos in past articles that I wrote. Ugh.)


As we built the Tutor/Mentor library in the 1990s and 2000s we began sharing the information with our students and volunteers, encouraging them to use the learning resources to help students succeed in school and to help volunteers understand the history of slavery and racism and the continued challenges faced by people who live in areas of concentrated poverty, which are the areas highlighted on the EIG dashboards.

I've been singing this song for a long time as the 1997 T/MC Report newsletter shows.  Here's a more recent article, posted in 2015.  It includes the graphic shown below.


I highlighted the part that reads "We can give ourselves a cozy feeling of cheaply acquired nobility by apologizing for past injustices. Or we can stop patting ourselves on the back and cross the tracks to the other side of town to take small, concrete, unglamorous steps to end present-day suffering."

This was written in 1997 following the President's Summit for America's Future, hosted by President Clinton and every other living President, to focus on improving the lives of the 14 million youth living in poverty in America.

One last graphic.  Take the YOU role and share this information.  Do what I've been doing.


I've written this blog since 2005.  I've shared this information on websites since around 1998.  I shared via print newsletters from 1993 to 2003 and email newsletters from the early 2000s till today. I've posted regularly on social media.  

All to motivate more people to "cross the tracks" and "take small, concrete steps" that would help kids living in areas of concentrated, persistent poverty have mentor-rich pathways from birth-to-work.

If thousands of people in Chicago and other cities had shared this information as often over the past 25 years, and with their own creativity, perhaps there would be fewer areas of distressed communities and/or persistent poverty.  Maybe we would be closer to solving some of the other problems buried in our history as a nation.


Thanks for reading. Thanks for sharing.  Please spend time reading other articles on this blog.  Help me find leaders who will carry this work forward in future years. 

Find me on Twitter (X), LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon and other platforms (see links here).

I don't have a salary for doing this work (since 2011). So if you want to help, visit this page and make a small contribution.


Saturday, February 24, 2024

Athletes Adopt-A-Neighborhood Vision

I've been digitizing my files over the past couple of years and the big questions are "Who will look at these?" and "Who will take ownership, preserve, share and teach from these after I die?"  

One answer to the first question is "ME".  In looking at conversations and vision statements from the past I remind myself of what I've been trying to do and gain new ways of sharing messages that too few ever saw in the past.

Here's an example.  

In the 1990s a group of retired professional athletes was trying to set up a social enterprise where they would raise money by selling branded apparel and use that money to fund causes they supported. 

I told them of my vision of athletes using their visibility to draw attention and resources to youth tutor, mentor and learning programs in every high poverty area of Chicago. During one meeting they told me they were holding a golf outing and that other athletes would be participating.  I asked them if they would present my Adopt-a-Neighborhood idea and have athletes sign their name on a map showing high poverty areas of Chicago, to indicate their support for the concept.  

They did. That map is shown below.


The map was signed by Carlton Fisk, Tim Fisher, Steve Avery, Darryl Ingram, Jim Miller, Robyn Earl, Jason Herter, Otis Wilson, "J Peterman" - Sinfield, George Foster and Emery Morehead.  As noted on the map, signing this indicated support for the concept, but not a commitment to "adopt" a neighborhood and participate in the program. 

I've shared this graphic in several of my sports-focused blog articles, but without a lot of background information.  Today as I was looking at my digital library I saw this map and opened this PDF, created in 2011, which provides more detail on what I was hoping the Adopt-A-Neighborhood program would become.

Unfortunately, the group of athletes who had approached me never got their business off the ground and no one has ever provided the leadership and money to make this Adopt-a-Neighborhood idea a reality.

What if?  What if it had been adopted by a local sports team and if a year-end event for the past 20 years had featured high profile athletes and celebrities boasting about what they did to draw volunteers and donors to tutor/mentor programs in the neighborhood they had adopted.  What if there were a library, like my T/MI Theater page, showing athletes describing what they had done to support their adopted neighborhood for the previous year?

I think there would be a lot more comprehensive, long-term, mentor-rich youth programs spread throughout Chicago and other cities, and more kids would now be adults talking of how these programs had helped them through school and into jobs and adult lives.


I keep posting information about persistent poverty in America that shows the need to expand networks of support for youth and families in these places, so as we head further into 2024 and beyond, there's still a need for athletes and celebrities in every major city to adopt this idea.

I keep sharing ideas of what athletes and celebrities can do beyond what they already are doing.

So I encourage you to share this "Adopt-a-Neighborhood" idea.  Start a conversation. There are plenty of athletes and celebrities doing great work, yet I don't see any with a map saying "great work needs to reach every high poverty area of my city" and "I can't do it all myself."

Maybe one or two will adopt this as their "game plan" for making the world a better place.


I'm on social media so please connect with me on Twitter (X), Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Mastodon, BlueSky and/or Threads. See links here.

My Fund T/MI page is at this link.  If you value what I'm sharing please make a contribution to support my efforts. 

PS: I've not found an answer yet for the second question I started this article with.  

Saturday, February 17, 2024

Locating places with persistent poverty

My Twitter feed brought a new report to my attention this week. It's titled "Persistently poor, left-behind and chronically disconnected" and was written by Kenan Fikri who I've been following for a while.  (I'll use Persistent Poverty to refer to this report in the rest of this article.)

The map below was what caught my attention.  It shows areas of concentrated poverty in six Ohio cities.


I wrote about this on the Mapping For Justice blog a few days ago. You can read that article here

Today I zoomed into the interactive map shared on the Economic Innovation Group website to look more closely at different parts of the country where some of my #CLMOOC educator friends live. 

This map shows Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island.

This map shows Kentucky and Tennessee

This map shows Washington State


This map shows Chicago, Milwaukee and the area surrounding Lake Michigan. 


This map shows Washington, DC and Baltimore


What these maps show is that the places of concentrated, persistent poverty, are not everywhere. They are small parts of big cities like Chicago, or big states.  The mapping  platform is interactive, so you can look at other places and you can zoom in to the neighborhood level.  

Below is a screen shot showing the abstract describing the research where I found these maps.  


The abstract shows a focus on social networks and social capital and says "these problems tend not to resolve themselves naturally".
I've used maps since 1994 to try to draw attention and resources to high poverty areas of Chicago to help volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs grow and stay connected to youth and volunteers for many years.

Below are two images that illustrate this commitment:

The first is the front page of the 1995 Chicago Tutor/Mentor Programs Directory.  The map's shaded areas are places of concentrated, persistent poverty.  In the Directory, I listed volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs and provide contact information so parents, volunteers, donors, media, educators and social workers can find them.  View PDF of the Directory.


The second is my Total Quality Mentoring graphic.  This shows the goal of connecting youth living in high poverty areas with volunteers from different places and backgrounds, as mentors, tutors, activity organizers, friends and coaches.  

View this PDF to see my vision of leaders from different industries using their own time and talent to mobilize volunteers and donors to support tutor/mentor programs in different high poverty areas of Chicago. 

The role of intermediaries.  The graphic below shows the role the Tutor/Mentor Connection has taken since forming in 1993, and that the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC has continued to support since forming in 2011.

Read articles posted on this website since 2005 and the Mapping for Justice blog since 2008, and the www.tutormentorexchange.net site since 1999, and you'll see the information I've aggregated and shared to support efforts to help build and sustain mentor-rich programs in all high poverty areas of Chicago and other places.

The maps showing persistent poverty in America show other places where an information-based intermediary like the Tutor/Mentor Connection is needed.  My graphics and articles show the active role the intermediary needs to take to draw users to this information, help them understand it, and help them apply it to bring volunteers and dollars to every youth serving program in every high poverty place, for many years.


Colleges and universities in every city and state could create tutor/mentor connection research programs do duplicate the work I've piloted since 1993.  This PDF shows this goal.  All it takes is for one, or two, wealthy alumni to provide the money to pay for such a program, along with a dedicated faculty member who wants to lead this for the next 30 years or more. 


I've shared this story for many years. Every city needs people doing the same, for as long, and reaching more people.  Learn from my example. Borrow from my files Create your own libraries, blog articles and visual essays. 

Or, accept that we'll still have areas of persistent poverty 30 years from now.

You can find me on social media at Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Mastodon and more places. Find links here

At the right is a 1994 story from the Chicago SunTimes, showing how I traded my advertising job at the Montgomery Ward corporation to lead a tutor/mentor program.  The teen in the photo is now the mother of two college age boys, holds at least one MBA, and is a successful business woman.  That was our goal when we launched our program.

That can be the future for many kids living in high poverty areas, if you'll help organized, on-going, tutor/mentor programs reach them.

Do you value what I'm writing? Make a small contribution to help Fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute,  LLC. visit this page