The issues in the two conferences I attended and hosted were similar to those of the Non Profit Congress. In the focus on Capacity Building, Leadership and Public Awareness, engagement of businesses, colleges, seniors and youth were solutions offered in workshops I attended.

In order to share why I’ve learned with people who attended the Non Profit Congress meeting, or were not able to attend any of these events, I’ve posted links to some of the material and will be posting my own thoughts and follow up suggestions on my blog during the coming week. Visit http://tutormentor.blogspot.com/2008/06/national-conference-focuses-on-engaging.html and you can access this information.

In the Tutor/Mentor Connection I focus on “progress toward goal”. The goal is more site based tutor/mentor programs reaching more youth in high poverty inner city neighborhoods. Thus, my participation in May and June conferences aims to build collaborations that lead to greater public awareness in August and September as hundreds of tutor/mentor programs are recruiting volunteers for the start of the 2008-09 school year. Once we pass September, the goal will be to help these programs keep these volunteers and students engaged in weekly activities and convert them into effective tutors and mentors. If this is an interest for you in your own community, I encourage you to connect with us now so that this can have an impact on you and youth serving organizations in your community in a few months.

I was not able to download your leadership curriculum. I am offering workshops on Non-Profit Mergers and was interested in knowing if you currently have a workshop that covers restructuring and Mergers in strategic planning. If you do not, I would like to know how I could submit my information. Thank you,

Mabel Tinjaca, Ph.D.
(816) 392-3114
Strategies for Growth

There will be an area dedicated to nonprofit organizations who will use the event as opportunity to spread awareness of what they do, garner volunteers and funding support. Nonprofits reserve a table and facilitate an activity to engage visitors to visit their table. We anticipate upwards of 1000+ to attend the event. Email us at LiberatedMuseProductions@gmail.com if you’d like to be part of this event. http://www.capitalhiphopsoulfest.com

Personally, while I feel there is one giant non profit umbrella, there are many tents under this umbrella, each focused on different issues in different places and in different ways.

I fee that one step toward building greater public confidence, it to find a way to group non profits based on what their mission is, and where they provide their service. This type of grouping is able to be done with mapping software, that groups by zip code. It also is being done by people collecting information for volunteer search engines. For instance, at Volunteer Match you can search for a category of youth programs, and sort by zip code.

In my own case, my focus is on youth living in big city poverty, and on volunteer-based tutoring and/or mentoring programs who serve those youth. Thus, on my web site I maintain links to several hundred organizations who do this work, and use maps to show where they are needed, and where they are located. I host events, like a Tutor/Mentor Conference to bring us together every six months, but also to build public awareness of the need for these programs and the ways volunteers and donors can help. I use a blog and participate in many forums like this to “tell the story” in as many places as I can.

However, I don’t find many of my peers with blogs, or using their participation in forums like this, or in media-hosted forums which are beginning to grow on the web sites of TV and Radio stations, to tell their own story on a consistent basis, and to point to the need for this type of program to be in all parts of Chicago, not just in their own neighborhood.

Furthermore, I don’t see many with a rolling year-round strategy, so when they tell their story, they are talking about what is happening at that time of year. For instance, in May we’re near the end of the school year, so we need to talk about how we prepare for next year. In August, we’re starting the school year, so we need to talk about the way volunteers can help. In November we can be talking about what we’re doing and how year-end donors can help.

Imagine if hundreds of volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in different cities were telling their own story, but focusing on what’s important at that time of year. The stories would begin to deliver a similar message, and thus would attract the attention of more people. With enough good stories we can overcome the negative ones.

As the Non Profit Congress meets in June, I encourage you to teach organizations to “tell their story” on a more consistent basis, and to point to models of organizations already doing this. If you’re reading this and can’t come to the Non Profit Congress, or the National Conference on Volunteerism, which is the same week, or the Tutor/Mentor Conference, which is next week, then why not join us in on-line forums like this.

If so, I wonder if we did our own survey, framed differently (or not framed at all), what the results would be. Is it worth commissioning?