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April 2026 T/MI eNews

Issue 252

institute newsletter

Thank you to volunteers!

This month is volunteer recognition month. My work with tutor/mentor programs since 1973 has benefitted from the help of countless volunteers. That's beyond the several thousand who gave time as one-on-one volunteers. I'm still connected to a few of those people and some are making annual contributions to help me keep this newsletter and my library freely available to you and others.

I encourage you to browse my lists of volunteer-based tutor, mentor and learning programs that serve the Chicago region. Look at how each is recognizing their volunteers.

Then look at articles I've posted about turning volunteers into leaders

Visit https://tutormentorexchange.net/

In each month's newsletter I'll point you to a few new resources that I've found during the month, along with resources to help programs grow and to help volunteers, donors and parents find programs in the Chicago region and in other places.

While a majority of what I share is from my work helping Chicago tutor/mentor programs grow, the resources I share come from all over the USA and from other countries. The actions I've piloted since 1993 need to be duplicated in every area with concentrations of persistent poverty, where access to opportunity is consistently lower than in other places and where funding is scarce.

Please share this so others in your city can find and use these resources!

My yearbooks from the 1975 to 2000 period show how volunteers made these programs possible.

logic model

All of the people shown in this 1974-75 yearbook page were volunteers who held full-time jobs at Montgomery Ward or other companies. These were the people who worked behind the scenes to keep the program available to youth and volunteers.

During the 1970s most of our leaders came from our base of Montgomery Ward corporate office employee/volunteers. However in the 1980s as our volunteers began to come from more companies in the Chicago region our volunteer leadership group expanded to include more than Montgomery Ward employees.

We were able to do this because the program provided a structure that encourage youth and volunteers to connect and build relationships and that encouraged them to return from year-to-year. The program at Wards served 2nd to 6th grade kids. By 1990 parents were telling us that a program for older kids was needed. In late 1992 I and six other volunteers created that program. It was called Cabrini Connections and I led it until mid 2011. This PDF report shows a decade of service from 2000 to 2010.

This Tutor/Mentor blog article shows many of the mentoring connections that were built over the 1975 to 2011 years and includes links to yearbooks and year-end reports.

Does your organization have a volunteer-growth strategy?

IVMOOC 1994-2015

This graphic shows how many volunteers will become leaders of a tutor/mentor program and resource builders, too, if they are well-supported and stay involved for multiple years. View it in this article, and see how interns created new versions.

Read:
- Retaining Volunteers in Tutor/Mentor programs - click here
- Tips for Volunteers in Tutor/Mentor Programs - click here

Recently a friend on Facebook suggested that I should be sharing more with a podcast and with You Tube videos. I have created some videos in the past and here's one where I read the text on one of my blog articles.

While I could spend time creating more of these that does not guarantee that anyone will view them. Instead, you'll see an invitation at the end of many of my blog articles, inviting you and your students to create their own blog articles, podcasts and/or videos to share the ideas with people in their own networks. And, if they are not in the Chicago area, they can focus the attention on helping kids in their own cities, states and/or reservations.

On this blog I point to work Interns did while working for me in past years. I'd love to be pointing to pages where youth and volunteers from other programs are doing similar work. Just send me the links to your projects!

"State of Chicago Youth - 2026 report" continues to show need for more out-of-school time programs for Chicago youth.

IVMOOC 1994-2015

For the second consecutive year A Better Chicago has released a "State of Chicago Youth" report. It shows Chicago's low availability of out-of-school-time programs. Find a link to the report and my follow up comments in this blog article.

You'll also find a link to a page on the MyChi. MyFuture. website, that shows community networks that in 2023 and 2024 developed strategies to support growing youth serving programs in their areas.

While I welcome the renewed focus put on this problem, the reality is entrenched poverty has been with us for a long time and that won't change until we find ways to connect people from beyond poverty, with people living in high poverty areas, in ways that build greater empathy, understanding and a commitment to use personal wealth, resources and votes, to remove the barriers and provide more long-term programs that help kids move from birth-to-work.

Visit the RESEARCH section of the Tutor/Mentor library and read articles that I've aggregated over many years.

Visit this section of the Tutor/Mentor library for many more articles about poverty, race and inequality in the USA.

Volunteer recruitment and retention resources

IVMOOC 1994-2015

One section of the Tutor/Mentor library has links to many websites related to volunteer recruitment, retention and management. These include links to organizations like Volunteer Alberta, which has an extensive library of resources on its site. This graphic point to a PDF essay titled "Volunteer Alberta's (Re) Engaged: Volunteerism Report".

While the school year is just ending now's the time to be digging into research that can help you with your fall 2026 volunteer-recruitment campaigns.

Don't forget to visit this section with ideas for starting and sustaining volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs.

Site-based tutor/mentor programs can offer many types of learning

IVMOOC 1994-2015

This article on the Wallace Foundation website is titled "How can Arts Programs Help Young People Thrive?" If you operate a site-based program where kids and volunteers meet on a regular basis, you can offer more than weekly one-on-one tutoring/mentoring sessions. At the programs I led volunteers from different industries created our computer lab, our video creation program, along with writing and arts club activities.

These two visual essays show the potential of expanded learning in site based programs:
- Mentor Role in Larger Strategy - click here
- Total Quality Mentoring - click here

-Are you creating visual essays and/or videos that show the extra learning opportunities offered by your youth-serving program? Please share the links.

New resources for understanding of philanthropic giving

IVMOOC 1994-2015

Thanks to the vast power of artificial intelligence there's some exciting work being done to build a better understanding of philanthropic giving. In this article I point to work being done via Project 990 at Indiana University. The Smart Charity website is where they are sharing their research.

In the same article I also point to the Nonprofit Ecosystem Mapping Project on the GivingTuesday Data Commons website.

Both are gathering data from 990 reports filed by every nonprofit in the USA and are beginning to sort and map this, leading to a better understanding of what's being funded, who's being funded, where funding is going, and who's being overlooked.

If you have examples of other research and websites like this please share them.

View latest links added to the Tutor/Mentor library - click here

Resources and Announcements.

* Nonprofit Resilience Hub launched in Illinois - click here

* Black History Collection shown using Kumu.io maps - click here

* National School Garden Map - click here

* Nonprofit Resilience Hub launched in Illinois - click here

* SAGA Hi-Impact Tutoring - click here

* Have you visited the ESRI GIS map site? click here

* MyChiMyFuture - Chicago youth programs map and directory - click here; visit the website- click here

Visit this page for the list of Featured Links that I usually post in this newsletterclick here

Read These Tutor/Mentor blog articles

(Do you have a blog? Share it on social media.)

* Making Out-of-School-Time Programs more available - click here

* 25 Years Later. Funding Still Major Concern - click here

* Competing for Attention. Too Few Resources - click here

* Connecting People, Ideas and K-12 Youth from High Poverty Areas - click here

* Check out my articles on Substack.com - click here

Visit this page to find a list of highlighted resources that I usually have included in this newsletter.
click here

Thank you for reading this month's newsletter.

For those who don't want to receive this newsletter in their email, a copy of this and past issues can be found in my www.tutormentorexchange.net website.

I encourage others to duplicate what I'm doing. Write a blog and share your own vision, strategy and challenges. Share your link and I'll add it to this list in the Tutor/Mentor library.

View current and past newsletters at this link.

To subscribe, just Click here.
(If you subscribe, don't forget to respond to the confirmation email).

Please help fund the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC
Visit this page and add your support so I can keep this information available to you and the world.

Tutor/Mentor Connection (1993-present)
Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC (2011-present)

Serving Chicago and the world since 1993. Connect with Dan Bassill, founder and leader on one of the social media platforms.

eMail Dan at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. to schedule a ZOOM call and learn more about the strategies and resources he is sharing.

Social Media Connections

Do a web search for "tutor mentor" and you'll find us on many platforms.

Connect with Dan at

BlueSky - https://bsky.app/profile/tutormentor.bsky.social

Dan Bassill on LinkedIn

Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLCon Facebook group

Dan Bassill on Facebook Page

Dan Bassill on Mastodon - https://mastodon.social/@tutormentor1,
https://mastodon.garden/@tutormentor1 and @This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Dan Bassill on Instagram and on Twitter (X)

Dan Bassill on Medium - https://medium.com/@danielfbassill

Dan Bassill on Substack.com - https://substack.com/@danielbassill319958?

March 2026 T/MI eNews

Issue 251

institute newsletter

Build your understanding. Recruit new leaders!

This month I'm sharing some ways I've recently used AI to create a better understanding of some of my concept maps and blog articles.

I'm also showing new examples of what you'll find if you explore the Kumu.io map created by IVMOOC students at Indiana University to better understand participation in the May 1994 to May 2015 Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences that I hosted in Chicago.

I've streamlined the number of links that I share each month. I hope it makes the newsletter more readable.

Visit https://tutormentorexchange.net/

Please share this so others in your city can find and use these resources!

Have you tried to find your tutor/mentor program on this map showing 1994-2014 Tutor/Mentor Leadership Conferences that were held in Chicago?

logic model

In last month's newsletter I displayed work done by a team of students in an information visualization (IVMOOC) class at Indiana University. I encouraged readers to open the map (at this link) and try to find their own organization.

Above I is a view created by zooming in on 1997 conferences. I've circled the Midtown Center, which is one of the green nodes. In this LinkedIn post they show that they are celebrating their 60th year of service.

If you hold your mouse over any of the green nodes you'll get a view that shows all conferences that they attended. Below is what I found for Midtown Center.

IVMOOC 1994-2015

Actually, they attended at least five conferences.

This shows that they attended the May 1997 and November 1999 conferences. However, the Metro Achievement Center is also part of the Midtown-Metro Achievement Centers. I looked at the May 2002 conference and found the green node for Midtown Education Foundation. By holding my mouse over that node I can see that they attended the November 1996, May 2001 and May 2002 conferences. So actually, this organization attended at least five conferences.

I'm now working with a Spring 2026 IVMOOC team at Indiana University to update this visualization. In February I went through the Excel spreadsheet (6518 lines) that was used by the Fall 2025 team and tried to combine listings where an organization registered under more than one name, or changed its name over the 20 years that we offered the conference. I'm hoping they will create an updated map, that better reflects total conference participation. In addition, Ihope that you'll be able to search by organization to find a view showing all of the conferences they attended. I won't know if this happens until late April.

In the meantime, have some fun digging through the current interactive map. See what organizations you can find that you know and then share a jpg on social media, just as I've been doing.

What are the strategic reasons for business to adopt this strategy?

IVMOOC 1994-2015

Over the past few weeks I've used Google Gemini to create a fresh perspective and new understanding of some of the strategies I've shared with my concept maps, blog articles and visual essays. I've been pleased with the results.

The graphic above is from an article titled "R&D for Business Support of Tutor/Mentor Programs" which you can read at this link.

Here are other articles using Gemini

* "Can You Champion this Idea?" - click here

* "Tipping Point. Fixing the Distribution and Infrastructure Problem" - click here

* "From Blueprints to Careers: A Unified Strategy for Chicago's Future". It includes a sample speech that a CEO might give to a group of business leaders, showing her commitment to the ideas shared in this Tutor/Mentor Strategy Map. I posted this article on Medium. If you have an account you can "listen" to the post. - click here

* "Message from Faith Leader". I asked Gemini to provide a similar speech, but this time delivered by a faith leader. You can read that on this page.

You, or students and/or volunteers, can use AI to give you a better understanding of any of the ideas I've been sharing in my blog articles since 2005. Then, you can use what you learn to help build support for youth-serving programs in your city or state. I hope you'll try, then share links with me on social media.

"We are not very good as a country in dealing with long-term problems, except when they present themselves as a crisis."

IVMOOC 1994-2015

The quotes in the above graphic are from the early 1990s. You can see them in this article.

Most of what I've been doing aims to generate greater on-going visibility for EVERY volunteer-based tutor/mentor program in the Chicago region, to help attract more consistent support from business, philanthropy, faith groups, political leaders and more.

In the above article where I show sample speeches generated by Gemini I've shown how business and faith leaders can use their own positions of leadership and influence to draw others to the information I share on my website and blogs. My lists of youth-serving programs are the most valuable part of the library, because by maintaining a list I'm enabling others to help draw attention and resources to programs in EVERY part of Chicago and its suburbs.

By sharing this on the Internet I'm inviting people in other cities to use the resources and duplicate my strategies, if they don't already have someone doing what I've been doing.

"It takes a village to raise a child" is true. But it takes consistent, on-going outreach to bring people together to do the work and build the resources. In these trouble times, it's more and more difficult to get this message distributed. That's why it's more important than ever before that some people adopt these ideas as their own.

Note: If you find broken links or organizations that no longer operate, or know of other organizations that should be included, please share that information with me.

Steps to start and sustain a volunteer-based tutor/mentor program

IVMOOC 1994-2015

Most of the resources in the Tutor/Mentor library are intended to help people start and sustain, on-going, mentor-rich, non-school programs that reach K-12 youth in high poverty neighborhoods and build long-term connections between youth, the program and its volunteers.

In this blog article, and this section of the Tutor/Mentor website I share three visual essays with "Steps to Start a Program"; "Operating Principles"; an an "Annual Planning Calendar".

Use these ideas to help existing programs constantly improve and to help new programs grow where more are needed. If you're posting similar information on your own website or blog, based on your experiences, please share the links with me on social media platforms.

View latest links added to the Tutor/Mentor library - click here