One of the great things about Omidyar.net is that it enables me to meet others who share an interest in the same work. In January I met Paul DiPerna first on Omidayr.net, then at a meeting in Indianapolis.

Paul decided to interview me for his blog and the interview was posted today. You can read it at http://www.blauexchange.org/

For everyone who comes to Omidyar.net looking for donations I encourage you to visit the Give & Take page of the Chronicle of Philanthropy web site. http://www.philanthropy.com/give andtake/

It would be interesting to learn from Omidyar.net participants if their time spent in the blogs at the COP site give equal or greater value for time spent than in the O-net forums.

On Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2007 I was the guest of Debra Berg on a VoiceAmerica radio show called The Power of One: What's Your Mission ( http://www.powerone.org/id85.htm ). You can replay the interview from the VoiceAmerica web site. Just click on Archived Radio Shows.

Debra is an authority on The New Civic America. She has interviewed dozens of Americans who’ve taken on tough social problems and succeeded! Her book, “The Power of One”, was cited as a work that awakened the nation to a new 21st century trend of civic engagement and heroism. The radio show profiles people who are making a difference through their own efforts, illustrating the power each person has to make this a better world.

Volunteers who serve as tutors/mentors, or who help raise the money to support tutor/mentor programs, are demonstrating this power every day. I'll be hosting a Chicago conference in May to bring people together who lead these programs, want to start tutor/mentor programs, or want to help improve them. The web site is http://www.tutormentorconference.org and I encourage folks from Omidyar.net community to participate.

The next Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference will be in May. A new web site has been created for the conference. It is at http://www.tutormentorconference.org.

As we organize the face to face event, I'm recruiting partners to organize a variety of on-line events, such as blog exchanges, video conference, etc. where people can talk about the same issues as the confernece in Chicago, but without leaving their home or office.

If you have questions or would like to participate call me at 312-492-9614 or email tutormentor2@earthlink.net

I've added a new Google map feature to the Program Locator at http://www.tutormentorconnection.org. Now when you search for a tutor/mentor program in Chicago, you'll get a Google map showing where the program is located. While this is intended to help volunteers and donors and parents find tutor/mentor programs, it's also intended to be used by programs in finding partners and resources.

Using the Google feature a program leader could also search for businesses, churches, hospitals, etc in the same zip code, who could be sources of volunteers, dollars, and job/internships for kids in the program.

This work was done by volunteers, which shows what's possible if we can unleash the talent that's in the world and apply it toward a network of purpose.

Over the past two years I've posted many messages showing how the Tutor/Mentor Connection has been working to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs grow in Chicago and in other major cities. That has been a three part effort

1. building knowldge of who does this work, what works, who supports it, etc.
2. drawing programs together to learn from each other and collaborate on capacity building
3. working with business and professional groups to create strategies that distribute funds annually to tutor/mentor programs in every part of the city, instead of just to one or two favorite, or highly visibilie programs.

The best example of our success in getting businesses involved has been the work we've done since 1994 to help the Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Lend A Hand Program grow at the Chicago Bar Association. Since 1995 the LAH has been able to award $30,000 to $50,000 each year in small grants to 20-30 different programs. While these were welcome, the size of the grant means the programs still had to find about 98% of the money needed to operate from other sources.

Yesterday the LAH received $2 million from the Chicago Sun Times as part of a legal settlement. These funds will increase the grant pool to as much as $300,000 per year, and dramatically increase the size of grants awarded to tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago area.

This is the result of our efforts to connect those who can help with volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs who are helping inner city kids reach careers.

The goal of the T/MC is to have this duplicated in every industry, so that tutor/mentor programs receive funds from many sources, not just the legal community. The way we hope to achieve this is that tutor/mentor leaders in other communities begin to work with the T/MC as collaborators so that the business and professional groups in their own community will adopt this strategy.

If any of you would like to learn more about how this has been accomplished, please post a message or email me at tutormentor2@earthlink.net.

Over the past two years I've posted many messages showing how the Tutor/Mentor Connection has been working to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs grow in Chicago and in other major cities. That has been a three part effort

1. building knowldge of who does this work, what works, who supports it, etc.
2. drawing programs together to learn from each other and collaborate on capacity building
3. working with business and professional groups to create strategies that distribute funds annually to tutor/mentor programs in every part of the city, instead of just to one or two favorite, or highly visibilie programs.

The best example of our success in getting businesses involved has been the work we've done since 1994 to help the Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Lend A Hand Program grow at the Chicago Bar Association. Since 1995 the LAH has been able to award $30,000 to $50,000 each year in small grants to 20-30 different programs. While these were welcome, the size of the grant means the programs still had to find about 98% of the money needed to operate from other sources.

Yesterday the LAH received $2 million from the Chicago Sun Times as part of a legal settlement. These funds will increase the grant pool to as much as $300,000 per year, and dramatically increase the size of grants awarded to tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago area.

This is the result of our efforts to connect those who can help with volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs who are helping inner city kids reach careers.

The goal of the T/MC is to have this duplicated in every industry, so that tutor/mentor programs receive funds from many sources, not just the legal community. The way we hope to achieve this is that tutor/mentor leaders in other communities begin to work with the T/MC as collaborators so that the business and professional groups in their own community will adopt this strategy.

If any of you would like to learn more about how this has been accomplished, please post a message or email me at tutormentor2@earthlink.net.

One of our volunteers has created a video that interviews tutor/mentor program leaders who have participated in Tutor/Mentor Conferences in Chicago. You can view it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8pqrFrhjUc

I'm hosting a Tutor/Mentor Leadership Conference in Chicago on Nov. 30 and you can review its goals at http://www.tutormentorconference.bigstep.com.

I've posted messages in various forums to recruit bloggers who will blog about the conference topics during December, with a goal of creating a larger network, a greater understanding, while influencing year-end donors to seek out tutor/mentor programs in Chicago and other cities for holiday and year-end contributions.

I'd like to find volunteers who might take this messagbe into Second Life. These volunteers could be people already involved with tutoring/mentoring, or people who want to learn to use Second Life to support a cause.

If anyone is interested in taking on this role, or if you're already doing it, please introduce yourself to me by emailing tutormentor2@earthlink.net or by posting your web address on my http://tutormentor.blogspot.com blog.

You can also add your address to the LINKS section at http://www.tutormentorconnection.org

The goal is not to help one single tutor/mentor program in onw neighborhood of a big city get the resources it needs, but to help every volunteer-based tutor/mentor program, in every high poverty area, get a more consistent flow of the resources they need to grow from good to great in helping kids who live in educationally and economically disadvantaged environments.

If you'd like to help, or are already doing this, I look forward to hearing from you.

From Sept. 5th through the next week or two I'm hosting a discussion at http://www.socialedge.org that focuses on ways leaders in business and professional groups can use their positions of influence to encourage volunteer involvement in service organizations in communities where a company does business.

Most small non profits who depend on volunteers for much of what they do are not blessed with resources to advertise consistently the way businesses advertise to draw attention to their products and services. Thus, they are inconsistently supported and not as well equiped to achieve their missions.

My goal is for businesses to use their own visibility, and self interest, to provide more consistent promotion of volunteer-involvement in community service, and to help this involvement have a greater benefit to the community, the employee, and the company.

Rather than dream up ways to achieve this, my strategy is to look for examples of CEOs and businesses who already operate this way. If we can borrow good ideas and put them to work in more places, we can have a greater impact than if we're just drawing from our own limited experiences.

If you'd like to contribute your own thoughts to the discussion just log into http://www.socialedge.org (or add your ideas here).