Digital Divide in Chicago - 2018 WBEZ article

This screen shot shows interactive map included in WBEZ article titled "Clear Signs Of The Digital Divide Between Chicago’s North And South Sides"

The article reports that "more than half the households in Englewood and nearly half the households in West Englewood (51 percent), Riverdale (49 percent), Auburn Gresham, and South Shore (both 46 percent), lacked internet access at home". 

This is a disadvantage for youth and adults.

I show these maps and articles with the goal that readers will be concerned and will share the articles with others, who will also be concerned, and that this will result in people from different sectors giving time, talent and dollars to help reduce this problem.

Browse other articles on this blog, and the Tutor/Mentor blog, and share with your network, as the graphic below suggests.

This work is not something that can be done in a day, or even a year or a decade. But it is work that needs to be done.  If you'd like help digging through the information I'm sharing, or in making sense of some of the graphics, I'm available.

If you appreciate what I'm sharing, please visit my FUND ME page and send a contribution.

Population Density of Largest US Cities

Population Density map

My Twitter feed brought to my attention this map showing population density in the largest US cities.  You can find the article describing contents of the map here, and the interactive map here.

I created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in Chicago in 1993 to help volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs grow in high poverty areas. As the Internet became a tool for me to gather and share ideas, I've sought out people in other big cities, because the challenges of concentrated poverty, segregation, inequality and population density are similar.

That means that some day I should be able to produce a map, with icons on each blue circle, indicating one, or more, people from that city is following me on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin, reading my blogs, and interacting around the same challenges and questions I ask every day.

In the map below I show people who attended Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences that I held in Chicago every six months from May 1994 to May 2015. If you compare it to the population density map, you could see that I was connecting with people from some of these cities.

May 1994-May 2014 conference participation map - click here

However, those connections did not turn into on-line connections and, for the most part, on-going connections.  They also did not include business leaders, funders and/or policy makers, which is one reason I no longer host the conferences and struggle to keep the T/MC alive in Chicago. 

I'm still trying, but I think it will take finding others from different cities to help with this effort. 

In addition, each city should have someone creating maps showing who is connecting on a regular basis to help needed youth serving programs grow in that city. The map at the right shows participation in one of the Chicago conferences. You can see several maps like that on this page. 

If this were happening it would indicate that groups of people are meeting within a city, and within neighborhoods of each city, and that they were connecting with people in other similar cities, with a common goal of helping economically disadvantaged kids more successfully through school, which has a economic benefit to the business sector and the entire urban region.

So far I don't see this happening.

Thus, if you're reading this. Share it with people in your own community and network who might also be focusing on filling high poverty areas of their city with a range of mentor-rich programs that reach more k-12 kids, last longer, and result in more being in jobs when they are in their mid 20's than what is the reality today, in 2018.

Maps that should be part of learning in US schools

In this Vox.com article the author shares sixteen maps that most American's probably don't spend much time thinking or talking about.  I created this montage from the maps in the article.

Opportunity Index article in Chicago Tribune

Below is a Tweet that points to article in today's Chicago Tribune, describing the different opportunities available to youth in different parts of Chicago.

Same city, different opportunities: Study maps life outcomes for children from Chicago neighborhoods https://t.co/OxZBvIH72E pic.twitter.com/3jNNhsoJps

— Chicago Tribune (@chicagotribune) October 17, 2018

In the concept map shown below I point to several different data platforms that you can use to understand where people need extra help.

Click here to open cMap. Then click on box under each node to open links.

The number of data maps has grown tremendously over the past 10 years. However, the number of people using these as tools to guide needed resource, jobs, health, education and youth support programs into each of these areas has not yet grown to the same extent.

World Wide Inequality Index - Interactive Map

Inequality Index

I created the Tutor/Mentor Connection in 1993 with the goal of collecting and sharing information showing work being done in some parts of the world that could be borrowed and duplicate in other places.  Instead of constant reinvention, we need constant learning and innovation.

With that in mind, here's a web site/data map showing a World Wide Inequality Index, which is an annual "global ranking of governments based on what they are doing to tackle the gap between rich and poor".

Reclaim American Dream

Here's another example. This is from the Reclaim the American Dream web site. On a map showing US states you can find information showing legislative work being done in some states that can be inspiration and models for similar work to be done in other states.

Click here to see map

I've been adding links to sites like this to various sections of the Tutor/Mentor web library, and to the concept map shown at the right, as well as posting stories that point to some of them. (see links on right side of this blog)

I learned about the Inequality Index from an article on the From Poverty to Power blog, which is one of the blogs I point to in the web library.

I don't have any money for advertising (never had much) so use my blogs and social media to try to draw attention to the information I'm putting in my library. As others share this in their own networks, my goal is that more people will learn to use these platforms to learn what's working in some places that might also work where they are located, if they can find resources to implement the ideas.

Thus, getting people involved from every sector is really important if we want to try to reduce some of the complex problems facing us in Chicago, the US, and around the world.

You can help by following this blog, or the Tutor/Mentor blog, and sharing posts on social media sites.

If you value the work I'm doing, and the web library I host, please visit my FUND ME page and send a contribution. 

Mapping Opportunity - Casey Community Opportunity Map

Community Opportunity map view

On Monday I posted an article showing a map of Chicago's West Side neighborhoods, using an Opportunity Atlas which was featured last week in a New York Times article, and has been mentioned often on social media since then.

Today I found a different Community Opportunity Map, created and hosted by the Casey Family Programs.

Opportunity Atlas map view

Both of these platforms offer a load of information.  I am particularly impressed with the Casey map, in how easy it is to draw boundaries around an area and receive a table of data showing different indicators for that area.  I drew the entire West side just to compare one map with the other, and with the map I host that shows non-school youth tutor and/or mentor programs in the same area.

Chicago Tutor / Mentor Programs

Neither of the two opportunity maps has layers of information showing youth and family services and other assets in these areas, which all need consistent attention and an on-going flow of talent, ideas and operating dollars to be effective.

Thus, users will need to do what I do, which is combine map views from different platforms in order to tell a story that starts out showing where people need help, then moves to an analysis of what help is already available, and then a conversation of how to help existing services grow and stay available, while also filling voids where more services are needed.

If this is a process you're applying through your planning and community support efforts, please share a link to a web site where you describe and show your work.

Like the information I'm sharing? Go to this FUND ME page and send a contribution to help me keep doing this.