Visit http://mappingforjustice.blogspot.com to view a map showing locations of organizations who participated in the May 29 and 30 conference which was held in Chicago. While the conference is over, the issues we focus on are not yet solved. There are not enough volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in high poverty areas, and the infrastructure to support programs is weak. The map reinforces this and can is intended to encourage volunteers and donors to contact the various programs who participated in the conference to offer time, talent and dollars.

You can learn more about the May conference agenda at http://www.tutormentorconference.org/descriptions.asp .  You can browse the attendee list to see who registered, and to contact people  who you'd like to network with.  Hopefully this helps more people working to support tutoring/mentoring in different locations stay connected, and find ways to help each other.

We're now beginning to look forward to the August/September Volunteer Recruitment Campaign and a November networking event and conference.  If you would like to share information about your tutor/mentor strategy, or share expertise in fund raising, marketing, evaluation, collaboration, etc. use the presenter form on the conference site to submit your workshop proposal so you can be part of a future conference.

We have more than 1400 links on this web site, to people and organizations whose knowledge we value, and share so others can learn from you.  The conference is an oppportunity for some of these organizations to meet face-to-face, share what they do via workshops, and expand the network of people who work together to help kids move from poverty, through school, and into jobs and careers.  The conference is a grass roots, collaboration, of many different organizations who share the same ultimate goal.  We hope you'll make time to join us in online forums or upcoming events.

In 24 states voters cast ballots to determine who would be candidates for the next President. While that election won't be decided until November, you can vote today, tomorrow and every day, to make a difference in your community, by the way you get involved with non profit groups.  Today's Chicago SunTimes editorial says "Still Want to Make a Difference?" and gives five ways, including tutoring kids, where you can get involved.

The SunTimes editorial points to this web site, as a place to find volunteer opportunities.  Click on the Find A Program link and you can find links to web sites of more than 200 different organizations. Some have multiple sites. Some have great web sites. Some are small single sites.  They all need help from volunteers, and from donors. 

If you are overwhealmed by the information on this web site, start here, and learn how this can be a resource for not only finding a volunteer-opportunity, but for staying involved and making a difference in the lives of children throughout the Chicago region.

Not in Chicago?  The information on this site is valuable for volunteers, program leaders, donors and business leaders in every major city of the US where there are high concentrations of poverty.  If you don't have an agency like the Tutor/Mentor Connection, maintaining a database of local programs, then borrow our idea and build one.  If you need reasons why, then read the articles in the research section of this web site.  Want help?  Email the Tutor/Mentor Connection at tutormentor2@earthlink.net

On February 12 and 13, 2008 the President's Council on  Service and Civic Participation  will convein a CEO Summit, aimed at challenging corporate leaders to leverage their employees' professional skills to help the non-profit sector achieve more meaningful outcomes for communities. Learn more at

https://www.regonline.com/builder/site/Default.aspx?eventid=157462

After the Summit, invite your CEO to review the strateges of the Tutor/Mentor Connection and become a strategic partner, using the talent of  a corporation to help develope the future and current workforce of that corporation and industry.  View the T/MC vision: http://cmapspublic.ihmc.us/servlet/SBReadResourceServlet?rid=1178301962705_378512451_14531&partName=htmltext

Each year the January National Mentoring Month celebrates the role mentors play in the lives of all of us. As we think of who has been our mentor, we ask you to focus attention on kids living in inner city neighborhoods where kids and families need extra mentors, and extra learning and experience opportunities in the non-school hours. These are places where tutor/mentor programs like Cabrini Connections are needed. In the Program Locator and Chicago Program Links sections of this web site you can find dozens of programs like Cabrini Connections. Each is constantly looking for resources (dollars, manpower, leaders, ideas, technology, etc.) that they can use to maintain connections between mentors and youth.

Learn how your company can recruit talent volunteers (PDF), to help build stronger tutor/mentor programs in Chicago and other cities. Learn ways you can be more consistent in connecting people in your network (pdf)  to tutor/mentor progams in your city.

Please consider a 2008 donation to the Cabrini Connections or to one of the other mentoring/tutoring organizations listed on our web site to help every tutor/mentor program in Chicago, and in other cities, continue this service in 2008 and beyond. Thank you.

This week Daniel F. Bassill, President, CEO and Founder of the Tutor/Mentor Connection and Cabrini Connections is the featured interview on the Blau Exchange web site, hosted by Paul DiPerna.  The Interview can be found at http://www.blauexchange.org/int_dbassill.html 

The Blau Exchange Project is a web-based initiative that will be an intermediary for professional groups interested in how information and communications technologies (ICTs) affect society, with particular focus on the Internet and World Wide Web.  This project honors Peter Blau, one of the 20th century's most influential sociologists.