Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference in Chicago...and On-Line

Each May and November since 1994 the Tutor/Mentor Connection has invited people from its network and link library to come together to share ideas, build relationships, and innovate ways to build a stronger infrastructure to support comprehensive, on-going, volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs, reaching inner city youth in Chicago and other cities. The next conference will be Nov. 19 and 20 at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill and we invite you to participate.

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Comment by Daniel Bassill on November 13, 2009 at 5:25pm

Here's a blog article by Valdis Krebs, showing how our network has grown since we first met on Omidyar.net a few years ago.

This illustrates how networking can be mapped, and demonstrates the result of intentional network building. If you know people at your universities interested in social network analysis, I encourage you to have them take a look at this and follow our progress.

Comment by Daniel Bassill on November 6, 2009 at 11:35am

I attended a Drop Out Summit in Illinois this week. One article that I read was a "birth to work" white paper. I wrote about it and posted a link on my blog.

This paper calls on people beyond traditional educators to take a responsibility for preparing our future workforce. The conference we host in Chicago is a place for such leaders to connect and talk about the work that needs to happen so that there are mentor and learning connections in high poverty neighborhoods where these visions of creativity and innovative learning might take root, even if they are not happening in the local schools.

Comment by Daniel Bassill on October 9, 2009 at 1:16pm

I encourage you to read this newsletter from Telementor, an e-mentoring organization based in Colorado. One article is written by Ron Berger, who talks about "quality" and "excellence" in education. David Nels, the ED of Telementor, and I have carried on phone and email conversations for many years. We talked today and I'm hopeful that he'll come to Chicago for the November conference. I'm also hopeful that we can connect with people like Ron Berger, either through the conference or on-line forums.

Comment by Daniel Bassill on October 9, 2009 at 1:03pm

Another way folks in this group can help me do what I do is to support us with a small donation during the Case Giving Challenge on Facebook. We're asking that people target their donations to Fridays so we can compete to win the daily awards for the most donors per day. Our cause page is http://apps.facebook.com/causes/posts/317012

Comment by Daniel Bassill on October 9, 2009 at 10:44am

The conference can be well attended if people who learn about it through forums like this make an effort to tell the people in their own networks to look at what the T/MC is doing and what the conference offers. In reality, only a small fraction of all the people who need to be engaged in solving poverty issues will ever attend our conferences.

However, the awareness and networking that happens before, during and after each conference can attract a growing number of people who connect with us, and each other, and knowledge about the problems, in on-line communities such as Fireside Learning.

If these communities work to turn talk into actions, where people/organizations give time, talent and dollars to places where we are directly connecting with children, youth and families, then we will begin to solve the problems in bigger ways than we are now.

Comment by Connie Weber on October 9, 2009 at 7:25am

Good work, Daniel, you are a change-maker. You're opening pathways for people to help others and to help themselves.
The upcoming conference is very important--I hope it's well-attended and gets the media attention it deserves.
Thanks for all you do; so happy to have you as a colleague...

Comment by Daniel Bassill on October 8, 2009 at 1:56pm

By the way, the blog address for this media map is http://tinyurl.com/TMCblog-MediaMap10-08

Comment by Daniel Bassill on October 8, 2009 at 1:55pm

This week national media have been pointing to the violence in Chicago. Media are calling for solutions and continued, long-term involvement. I wrote a blog article with links to these stories, and some of my own suggestions. I created a "media map" to illustrate how these stories on one day need to be repeated for many days and years.

One way all of you might be involved is to recruit student teams to map local media stories that focus on poverty, education, violence prevention, etc. Posting those maps on their own blogs could make them leaders in providing on-going attention, and mobilizing volunteers and resources. This is network building, and one of the workshops at the Nov. 19 and 20 conference in Chicago will focus on Social Network Analysis.