Design Innovations for Social Change

This video illustrates a design project that I would like to emulate through the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC



The video showcases work done by different groups of students and volunteers following the 2011 Tsunami and earthquake in Japan.

At this page I show projects done by interns to visualize and draw attention to ideas of the Tutor/Mentor Institute. In this group you can see how I coach interns in this process.

If I can find sponsors and partners I can create an ongoing design project intended to expand the number of people who provide time, talent and dollars to help youth in high poverty areas move through school and into careers.

If you can help post a message on Twitter or join our Facebook or Ning group to introduce yourself.

Volunteer your talent with Tutor/Mentor Institute

Below is a graphic created last spring by Sam Lee, an intern from IIT working with my organization in Chicago. Work of other interns can be seen in the blog articles on this web site.



Below is the graphic that she used for inspiration. 



Sam broke this into two graphics. The first part is shown above. The second is shown below:

Over the summer the Tutor/Mentor Connection has been separated from the non-profit structure of Cabrini Connections. Dan Bassill, president and founder of Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection (see time line) has created the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC as a new structure to continue the work that has been done for the past 18 years.

We hope that interns, volunteers and different organizations will continue to work with us as they did in the past. While we have had one or two interns every few months working with us, we feel that students in high schools and colleges all over the world could be doing what our interns have been doing. Instead of one student creating an interpretation of a single idea there could be dozens of students creating multiple interpretations. The result would be growing understanding and growing involvement.

If you'd like to get involved join the forum at http://tutormentorconnection.ning.com and introduce yourself.

Networking Strategy of Tutor/Mentor Connection

Visit the Tutor/Mentor Connection form and see the work interns and volunteers are doing to help Tutor/Mentor Connection reach more people who might become leaders, volunteers and donors in support of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in many cities. This graphic is a new interpretation of a graphic posted in this blog article.

Volunteer Recruitment Video

Minsub Lee, a 2011 intern from IIT and Korea, created this video to support volunteer recruitment. The link on the video points to this page on the Tutor/Mentor Connection web site where people from Chicago and other cities can get ideas for mobilizing volunteers.

During the summer we invite teens and volunteers from other programs to submit videos that they create to promote volunteer and donor involvement in tutor/mentor programs. We'll share links to those that do the most to bring these resources to all programs in a geographic area, in addition to the host program.

What can sports stars do?

This graphic is from a new animated video was created by an intern from Korea working with the Tutor/Mentor Connection during May/June 2011. It was created from the ideas in this pdf and these blog articles. Play video.

Our goal is to teach athletes who already have set up foundations and support youth programs to go one step further and use their visibility to motivate fans to support tutor/mentor programs throughout the city where they play sports. If enough athletes do this, and if some use their web sites and blogs to create their own versions of these videos, we can fill the stands with many more volunteers, donors and fans helping tutor/mentor programs reach inner city kids.

Animation communicates idea in new way

This graphic is from this animated video created by Sam Lee, an intern from IIT working with the Tutor/Mentor Connection.

Spring 2011 Interns add new talent

This graphic was created by Sam Lee, a new intern from IIT working at the Tutor/Mentor Connection this spring. She read this blog article, then created this interpretation.

Interns from many colleges and high schools can be doing similar interpretations. As they post them to their own blogs and the T/MC forum we can draw more attention to the ideas and more support to volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in many cities.

Contact the T/MC if you'd like to be involved.

Service Learning Loop Shows how Volunteer Grows

In 2007 our second intern from Hong Kong Baptist University, Paul Wei, began to learn to use flash to create animated interpretations of ideas of the Tutor/Mentor Connection. He was not able to complete this project or add a voice-track before he left.

During Jan-Feb 2011 In Hee Cho, an intern from IIT in Chicago, took on this project and created this interpretation.

Note: As of 2017 Flash Animation presentations such as this one, can no longer be viewed on most browsers. You can download a swfplayer and still view them. However, I've created this video so you can still see the presentation. 

We hope that many people will look at this and other work done by interns in past years. Through these projects we hope to create new ways to interpret our ideas and motivate more people to adopt them in their own efforts to help inner city youth have the support systems needed to move to jobs and careers.

If your high school or college would like to work with T/MC on these projects, or if your company or foundation can be a sponsor, there is much we can do to provide ideas and guidance that any one in the world might use.

Leadership Pyramid - IIT Intern Project

Today was the last day of the Jan-Feb 2011 internship of Jongseop Won who came to us via IIT and his university in Korea. Here's the information we provided to guild Jonseop in working on this project.

This flash animation is his interpretation.

As others look at this information we hope they see how important it is to have intermediaries like the Tutor/Mentor Connection collecting information and supporting decisions and actions of volunteers and leaders throughout the Chicago region.

Interns creativity on display

Jongseop Won is one of our winter 2011 interns from Illinois Institute of Technology. This graphic shows how he is creating a new interpretation of the pyramid that the T/MC includes in this "building a network of purpose" essay. Visit this page to follow his progress on this project. Follow the work being done by interns from IIT, Adler School of Professional Psychology, National Louis University and beyond.

The T/MC ideas that are originated as sketches then converted to power point can be interpreted in many ways by students working at high schools and colleges throughout the world. Contact us if you'd like to be involved.

New Interns at CC, T/MC

This graphic was the way Cho In Hee introduced herself today in the Tutor/Mentor Connection on-line Forum.

She and Jongseop Won are starting six week internships with Cabrini Connections, Tutor/Mentor Connection. They will be creating visualizations to help communicate T/MC ideas to leaders all over the world who might understand the T/MC through these presentations and reach out to support us in the ways suggested.

In addition, Joseph Kreul has also joined us this week, as part of a six month internship program sponsored by The Adler School of Professional Psychology

As each volunteer and intern goes through this service and learning loop we hope they know more about poverty and ways leaders need to provide consistent, long-term support to organizations helping kids grow up. We also hope they learn to share this with the colleges they represent, their friends and family, and with people who visit our web sites, so that more people will become involved because of what these students communicate during the time they are with us, or in the future.

You can see from this post that the service learning loop graphic was created by an intern from Hong Kong who was with us in 2007.