My organization has been building something similar to what Darren
Hedley has described over the past 8 years, focusing on the urban poor
living in Chicago.
When we started in 1992 our goal was to identify all of the existing
non-school tutor/mentor programs operating in Chicago, benchmark what
age groups were being served, what time frames service was available,
and what number of youth and volunteers were involved. Our goal was to
"learn everything there was to know about tutoring/mentoring" and to
share that on an on-going basis so that others would have more
information to chose from in improving their own programs, or in
launching new programs to fill voids.
Our first survey in 1994 was responded to by 120 agencies. More than
half said they had "little or no contact with each other". More than
70% said they'd like more contact. More than 90% said they'd come to a
"learning conference" if it was free or low cost and fit there schedule.
So we organized a first conference in May of 1994 and 70 people showed
up. At the same time, we were struggling with how to communicate to the
public where these programs were located in the city. Our solution was
to plot the location of programs using a GIS data base. At the time of
the first conference, we published a listing (Directory) of programs, and
used our GIS to show where these programs were in relation to each
other, and in relation to the highest concentrations of poverty in the
city.
Our the past years we've come to understand that "learning and sharing
everything there is to know" is really a process of building a
"knowledge system". We've also come to realize that the Internet makes
it possible to do this and that our web site can be a "virtual library"
with links to others around the world who are also collecting and
sharing this information.
Our learning constantly helps us innovate new ways or new understanding
of our own efforts. The growth of "open source technology" has given us
a model to emmulate. We and everyone else who is concerned about the
urban poor represent a growing community of people who can share what we
know in a process of building "a better operating sytesm".
Our maps help us understand where help is needed. Our links help us
understand why we are needed, and what models that work well in one
location might be distributed throughout a city and work well in many
locations.
The 365 day calendar is the same for all of us. That means that there
are opportunities to come together face to face, or via the internet, at
different times during the year in ways that draw more attention to our
cause, more visitors to our "learning library" and more dollars and
business partners to help us.
In the next few days I'll take a look at Darren's web site. If it
represents new "knowledge" or reinforces "existing models" I'll post it
as a link on www.tutormentorconnection.org. That way my sites visitors
can learn from Darren, and maybe even become his partners. As others
who are concerned about the Urban Poor learn to link to me and others in
this movement, we create a traffic flow through the system far greater
than each of us might generate by our own individual actions. As we
join on key events, this generates public visibility all over the world.
To me there is an unbelievable power being unleashed by this process. No
longer do we need to wait for governments or power-brokers to take the
lead to solve problems. Individuals in small groups can build web
communities and link into larger communities so that new ideas can be
heard by millions of people. If an idea is good enough, it can take the
lead in this movement, or in any other movement.
Our ability to create access to technology and communications tools in
urban poor neighborhoods, as well as in rural and third-world poverty
neighborhoods is essential to unleashing the huge wealth of talent and
creativity that exists.
Daniel F. Bassill
President
Cabrini Connections
Tutor/Mentor Connection
Chicago, USA
www.tutormentorconnection.org
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