Keeping the PIPblog magic alive

Hello! So as you've hopefully realized from my past few posts, I'm officially finished with my PIP fellowship. Though I'll be continuing to contribute (albeit less frequently) both here on this blog and in other places, Bradley Troast, the new 2009-2010 PIP fellow at CC/TMC has already begun blogging about his experiences on the new PIP blog. So I would strongly recommend checking out Bradley's blog, since it will be updated a heck of a lot more often than mine, now that I'm no longer an official employee. In his first couple weeks on the job, Bradley has already blogged about our recent Golf Benefit and Edgewood College Visit as well as our brand-spankin' new and improved Video Club and his thoughts on his new work. It's clear he is getting off to a great start so be sure to add http://cabrinipip.blogspot.com/ to your RSS feed reader of choice and stay tuned!

PIP and P55 Seminar at Cabrini Connections, The Tutor/Mentor Connection

This Wednesday, PIP and P55 fellows from Princeton, Northwestern, University of Chicago and Colorado College will be taking a break from the daily grind at their respective non-profits/community organizations to find out a bit about what we do here at Cabrini Connections, The Tutor/Mentor Connection. So, I thought that I would provide a road map to our discussion here on my blog with the links that we plan on referring to during our presentation, so that interested fellows can easily find and share the information we present with others or return to articles/web sites that they find particularly interesting.

I kick things off by talking about a bit of our history which can be found on the www.cabriniconnections.net website if you click on the "about us" tab on the left side of the page.

A detailed organizational history can be found here.

I continue on to discuss our strategy for making a life-changing difference in the lives of youth living all across the city and how that manifests itself at both a local and a global level, making use of some graphics found on our www.tutormentorexchange.net site, which is an information hub that helps build a convergence of ideas and strategies, resulting in constantly improving tutor/mentor programs being available to more youth in high-poverty neighborhoods.

This pdf essay explains the logic of the Tutor/Mentor Connection.

Next, former PIP fellow and Tutor/Mentor Connection Coordinator, Nicole White discusses our four-part strategy for accomplishing this mission.

1) Collect knowledge from key stakeholders about volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs: how programs succeed, where programs are located, and where more programs and resources are needed.

2) Aggressively share this knowledge through marketing and public awareness campaigns, capitalizing on the Internet as a chief vehicle of communication.

3) Strengthen involvement of community and industry leaders to increase essential resources to tutor/mentor programs.

4) Facilitate understanding and collaboration among stakeholders to develop the long-term, integrated actions needed to help youths move from birth in poverty to a job or career by age 25.

Mike Trakan explains our innovative use of GIS mapping: http://www.tutormentorprogramlocator.net/

Mike's Mapping for Justice Blog: http://mappingforjustice.blogspot.com/

I discuss our utilization of "social media" and how we create evangelists for our cause:

Chris’ PIP blog

Nicole’s Tutor/Mentor Connection blog

Dan Bassill’s Tutor/Mentor Leadership blog

EL Da’Sheon’s Cabrini Connections blog

Vjeko's eLearning and Technology blog

Engaging Northwestern Students via: http://nututormentor.ning.com/

Sharing tutoring/mentoring leadership strategies via: http://tutormentorconnection.ning.com/

http://www.classroom20.com/profile/tutormentor/

http://www.socialedge.org/ (just search “tutor mentor”)

Welcome to the blogosphere

Hello world! My name is Chris Warren and I'm a recent graduate of Northwestern University, where I studied cognitive science and psychology... among other, perhaps more important things. However, for the next year, I am fortunate to have been selected to be a Northwestern University Public Interest Program fellow and will be helping to coordinate a related pair of Chicago NGOs known as Cabrini Connections and Tutor/Mentor Connection. These sister organizations believe in the power and effectiveness of tutor/mentor programs to help inner-city youth expand their professional networks so that they can enter careers by the age of 25. Cabrini Connections is itself a tutor/mentor program that serves Cabrini Green youth in the 6th-12th grades whereas Tutor/Mentor Connection has the aim of helping well-organized and successful programs like Cabrini Connections, which only serves one small area of Chicago, flourish throughout the city in every high-poverty area of Chicago.
Throughout the year I'll be relating my experiences working as a PIP fellow and more generally as a recent college graduate new to the non-profit sector. My only prior experience working with non-profits came during my 5 month stint studying abroad in Buenos Aires last year where I interned with the Central de Trabajadores Argentinos, an NGO that fights in various capacities for worker's rights including the right of un- or underemployed workers to a job. There I was able to conduct independent research on the recuperated factory movement that is so unique to the region. Therefore, with that lone experience under my belt I'm venturing forth into my succinct new role as "Tutor/Mentor Coordinator/Communicator/Resource Builder". Please stay tuned!