Using Maps for Planning Grant Making

 I've posted several articles showing my goal of having maps used strategically in deciding where grants are distributed with a goal of coaching a better flow of operating and innovation dollars to normally neglected areas.  When I've seen a promising practice I point to it with an article and a link. Sadly, that's not too often.

However, here is something that I saw today that looks promising.  The description provided on the web site says: "The maps on this site are part of the COVID Response Dashboard, developed by the Center for High Impact Philanthropy in collaboration with Philanthropy Network Greater Philadelphia. They include grant award data from participating funds serving Southeastern Pennsylvania and Southern New Jersey."

This platform focuses on the greater Philadelphia area and on grants focused on Covid19 relief and seeks to show where funding is being distributed and where more is needed. That's a planning tool that is needed for other categories, such as youth serving organizations. 

Below is the dashboard, described as a "Strategic Planning Tool" that was created to support this project.  I'm working on an older PC so this kept crashing on me as I tried to use it, so I hope others have better luck. However, the interactivity shows excellent potential.

This platform was created by Urban Spatial, a firm located in Philadelphia and led by Ken Steif, who I met on Twitter. Browse the website to learn more about what Ken feels is the potential for using platforms like this.

My goal for 25 years has been to host a platform like this, with several layers of information. We created a version of this in 2008 when a team from India built the Chicago Tutor/Mentor Program Locator (which is now only available as an archive). 

Across the top you can see tabs opening different resources and at the left you can see tabs that represent different layers of information.  You can zoom into this and create maps focused on specific areas of Chicago, as shown by the map below.

This shows levels of poverty, locations of poorly performing schools (from 2007 or 2008), locations of non-school tutor and/or mentoring programs, and locations of assets who could help programs within a geographic area do more to help kids.  Assets would be banks, churches, colleges, hospitals, insurance companies, etc.  

I posted a blog article a few weeks ago showing layers of information needed on a platform like this. 

The platform showing Covid19 funding in Philadelphia shows additional types of information that could be layers on such a map, and a dashboard that might help people use it better.

Building a platform like this would provide a tool any one in business, philanthropy or government could use to mobilize and distribute resources into high poverty areas, supporting the growth of a range of birth-to-work programs, which I've described in these articles. 

The Chicago Program Locator is now out-dated and I've not been able to update it since 2013. However it still works and demonstrates what's possible.

I don't have the talent, or funds, to build and/or manage such a platform. but I've built a platform that models what's needed and a strategy that collects information and and shares it regularly so more people use the platform to support youth program growth throughout Chicago. Thus, I'd be an ideal partner/consultant to someone who has the vision, commitment and resources to build an updated version.

I'm on social media at these places. Let's connect. 

9/14/2020 update - Philadelphia looks to be using maps in creative ways. Visit this Rebuild Philadelphia page and view the data maps. 

Black Male Achievement Funders Map - Excellent!

If you browse articles on this blog and the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC blog, I've posted maps that show where volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs and other forms of learning support are needed, based on data like poverty, poorly performing schools, violence and health indicators. In a few articles I've indicated a need for maps showing where funding was being distributed, so more organizations and activists could use that information to encourage continued funding where it is now landing, but to increase funding in areas where more, or better, tutor/mentor programs are needed.

Thus I'm really pleased to encourage you to look at the Funders Map posted on the BMAfunders.org web site. BMA seeks to support organizations that offer Black men and boys in the U.S. greater access to the structural supports and opportunities needed to thrive. Thus, this map focuses on funding of those types of organizations.

I encourage you to browse the map and learn to use it. Read this Forbes article to learn more about funding of BMA programs.

If you zoom in you'll see grants distributed in some neighborhoods but not available in others. I'm not sure if this platform yet has the functionality of the Tutor/Mentor Program Locator, which enables map views (see right) to be created that show existing tutor/mentor programs in high poverty area. However it has a level of visual excellence that the Program Locator does not have and it has captured donor information, which the Program Locator does not do.

In the Forbes.com article is this quote: "George Soros, founder of Open Society Foundations, noted in the 2012 report, “this is a generational problem. It demands a long-term commitment.” I'd like to see an army of "story tellers" using this platform to educate donors and policy makers so the commitment and flexible operating funds are continued for a decade or two, and extended to every high poverty neighborhood (and to other minorities and girls).

I think more can be done.

What I feel needs to be created are a set of maps. First, concept maps need to be created that show the supports youth in poverty need as they move from pre school to jobs and careers. This map is an example.

Depending on the level of poverty, segregation and isolation in a neighborhood a child will need more or less of the supports shown on this map, and they need them starting at preschool. The nodes on this map have the ability to link to web libraries which contain links to web sites related to each node. Thus, people interested in learning about technology programs focused on middle school youth should be able to look at web sites of organizations already doing that work, or showing who funds that work.

If the blueprint shows the types of youth serving organizations needed at each age level,the map should show organizations doing that work, and what neighborhoods they serve. Thus, if tutor/mentor programs for middle school kids are important, you should be able to search the map to see if such programs are available in all high poverty neighborhoods, and if the are being funded by multiple donors.

You should also be able to look at program web sites and see blueprints like the one above, with highlighted areas showing what part of the work each organization is doing.

The Tutor/Mentor Program Locator was designed with this level of functionality. Thus you can look at layers of information, showing locations of various types of tutor/mentor programs, by elementary school, middle school and high school service levels.

I've not had funds to update the Program Locator's technology or data since 2009, yet it still represents a useful resource. I was able to create these map stories, using it. However, unless I can find partners and resources to improve the technology experience, and update the data, this will become a great vision, but useless tool.

I've reached out to BMA and similar groups to introduce my work, and to invite partnership. This has not yet led to anything where I could say "my ideas are included in their work" and their "network is supporting my work".

I'll keep trying. I'll also keep pointing to good work being done by others.

R&D for Business Support of Tutor/Mentor Programs

Many companies spend billions of dollars on research and development (R&D) so they stay competitive in their markets or capitalize on new opportunities. How many spend even a few thousand dollars a year researching reasons for being strategically involved in youth tutoring/mentoring programs? Think about that as you read the rest of this article.

This is National Mentoring Month, and the final event will be the National Mentoring Summit being held in Washington, DC. I've attended in the past and there are great speakers and many valuable workshops. However, I've felt that the ROI (return on investment) has not been as great as it could be. No matter how many people attend a conference, each person can only meet a few. No matter how many workshops are offered, each person can only attend one in each time slot. Unless the conference is building public awareness that draws support (dollars, volunteers, etc.) to my own organization in Chicago or another city, the money I spend for room, travel and conference fee may not be worth the investment.

Does this mean don't go? No. Does this mean I'm no longer hosting Tutor/Mentor Conference in Chicago. No.

What it means is that I feel we need to find ways to bring people to on-line spaces where each person can spend time digging into the information a conference might offer, or that each participant brings, based on their own experience. That means each person needs to be sharing their ideas more completely in on-line space. I hope my example serves as a model.

During October-Dec 2014 I posted a series of concept maps outlining the vision and strategy of the Tutor/Mentor Connection, now led by Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. In order for me to host this information, or be more effective communicating my ideas, I require consistent funding and talent. So do leaders of any tutor/mentor program operating in Chicago or any other city. Since government and philanthropic support are inconsistent, and don't reach all programs consistently, I've always focused on business as the prime supporter of youth tutor/mentor programs.

Why? Because it benefits their own workers while developing a future work force. This article focus on the untapped potential of business investment.

Following are some concept maps that I've created to illustrate this point.

This map shows reasons a business might support the growth of volunteer based tutor/mentor programs in cities where it does business, for strategic and workforce development reasons.

This map focuses on ways volunteer involvement in organized tutor/mentor programs might support workforce development within companies that encourage employee involvement and provide infrastructure support to places where employees do get involved.

This final map is a guide to "recommended reading" that company leaders might browse to build support for their own strategic, long-term involvement with volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in communities where they have facilities or do business.

Browse other articles on this blog to see how companies might use maps to support a growth of their involvement, or to serve as hubs for involvement of multiple businesses within the same geographic part of a city. Browse these leadership and workforce development articles on the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC blog, and this section on the T/MI web site, for more resources to support business investment in volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs.

I hope these ideas are being discussed at the Mentoring Conference in DC, but I also hope we can attract R&D people from thousands of companies in Chicago and other cities to on-line conversations where we dig deeper into the ideas represented by these maps. Perhaps we can even find a few companies to sponsor and lead this discussion.

Mapping Strategy Started in 1993

In 1993 I was telling a friend at Chicago's United Way/Crusade of Mercy about my new organization and it's goal of building a master database of non-school tutor/mentor programs in Chicago. She said "How will you show that information?" I said "I don't know.". She showed me a geography magazine and ways that data can be mapped, and I've been trying to harness this potential ever since then. The article at the left is from a 1994 Chicago SunTimes article.

The challenge with creating the types of maps you see on this blog are a) you need to collect the data on existing tutor/mentor programs in the Chicago region and keep it up-to-date; b) you need to collect demographic and school performance information from available sources; c) you need to be able to afford a mapping tool; d) and you need to have talent available who can use the mapping tool to create maps. I've never found a foundation and/or business partner who would fund this consistently, even though ESRI donated software and IBM provide money for computers back in 1995.

Yet, as this article in the this 1999 URISA trade association magazine shows, I've been able to create enough maps that stories have been told in various media at different times over the past 20 years. To many people I've become known as the "map man" because of how I constantly talk about ways maps could be used by leaders to guide the distribution of financial resources and support the growth of mentor rich k-12 non-school tutor/mentor programs in every high poverty neighborhood of Chicago, or any other major city with pockets of urban poverty.

I've been hosting Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conferences every six months since May 1994, and in these I've also shared maps via posters and workshops.

In late 2007 I received a $50,000 donation which enabled me to hire a part time map maker, Mike Traken, who created all of the maps shown and map stories on this blog, up till early 2011 when we ran out of money to keep Mike on staff. With part of the money we also hired a tech team from India who build the Interactive Tutor/Mentor Program Locator which you can use to create your own map view and maps. This PDF provides instructions for using the Program Locator.

If you think this use of maps has value, I encourage you to help me find sponsors, investors, business partners and volunteers to help me update the maps, build new maps, create advertising so more people know how to use them, and create new owners who have the same passion that I have for using maps to build a better distribution of needed services in high poverty areas of the country.

Sponsoring Dragons To Assist Youth Programs

Occasionally, Mapping for Justice gets a chance to get out of the cubicle and work with kids in the tutor/mentor programs I write about.

This month, Mapping For Justice has decided to support a team of students in the Cabrini Madness tournament – a yearly fundraising “tourney” that brings together "teams" of students, volunteers, program staffers, and outside leadership like you.

The tournament helps teach students to advocate/compete for themselves, while helping the Cabrini Connections program raise a few bucks (which is vital for a non-profit to continue pairing adult mentors with youth from all over Chicago) - all while having a little fun. Check out the tourney website.

So this Cabrini Madness season, Mapping For Justice has decided to support and help promote... drum roll...

Team 5Ds (aka The 5 Dragons), captained by an amazingly talented young man, Charles Hill, with lots of help from other bright Chicago Public Schools (CPS) students, Sean Mayfield and Erin Smith.

Every small donation you make with me, and every time you pass this article to friends and colleagues, we help support student efforts to support themselves, while raising awareness about the virtues of these programs - programs that not only help each student, but in turn help society, and help you and me as taxpayers.

Additionally, 10% of your donation will go to Cabrini Connections Tech Club, a weekly club that teaches tech-related volcational skills to a group of students who want a little extra help on their way from the CPS to college and career.

Meet the students captaining this effort:
Charles Hill
Sean Mayfield
Erin Smith (profile coming soon)

Please consider helping Mapping For Justice help Team 5Ds by making a small tax-deductible donation here.

Wish us luck, and please check in occasionally to find continued tourney updates here.

The Impact of Mapping Resources in a High-Poverty Neighborhood: A Reflection on the Map Kibera Project

A friend of mine pointed me to an ongoing OpenStreetMap project in one of Africa’s largest slums on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya. “Kibera” is inhabited by hundreds of thousands of poor people; has hospitals, schools, and structure; and yet amazingly, according to project leaders and a 3 minutes long BBC mini-documentary/slideshow, Kiberia remains hidden from the world - designated as forest on government, Google, and other publicly available maps.

Map Kibera is a project that was started in October 2009 by Erica Hagen and Mikel Maron (with initial funding by Jumpstart International). They advocate that, "without basic knowledge of the geography and resources of Kibera it is impossible to have an informed discussion on how to improve the lives of residents."

When my friend contacted me with a link to this project, he said he thought I'd find it interesting but also told me he thought, "this is pretty different than what you're doing." Actually, I contend that this is very similar in many ways to what we are trying to do at Tutor/Mentor Connection (T/MC).

The aforementioned BBC short film explains a bit more about why Map Kibera received funding necessary to staff volunteers and train 13 Kiberan youth in GPS/GIS and internet technologies needed to publish an interactive online map of their own community.

The project leader interviewed in the film says, "Our motivation was, and our belief is, that without basic geographic knowledge of a certain place you cannot talk about improving people’s lives."

"To enable people to have a bigger say in their futures," you need to "know how resources are distributed in a certain place – for example, how many schools there are… how many hospitals there are… how these hospitals are equipped… how much staff they have."

"If you open up the information or data [to others], there is no saying what can be achieved out of this because a million people have a million ideas and a million things can happen."

Tutor/Mentor Connection is working with a staff of three people and no real funding to try and accomplish a similar thing in Chicago's high-poverty neighborhoods.

Are there a ton of differences between the poor of Chicago and the poor of Nairobi? Of course. But there are also many similarities. We aspire to take an inventory of all resources in our high-poverty, high-crime neighborhoods - using volunteers and empowering youth and citizens who live in the neighborhoods. Our goal is to encourage alliances and investment in student programs that improve at-risk students' lives, and in the long-term when these students grow up with their new skills through tutoring and mentoring, improve America.

We have created an information hub of maps, data, strategies, and information, and are hoping there are "millions of people" out there with the talent and ideas to join us and make small investments of time and money to make something powerful like Map Kibera happen right here in Chicago.

I found the wiki for the Map Kibera project particularly exciting, because it documents several of their challenges as well as the specific impacts their investment has made in Africa. Most of these are also very familiar to us here in Chicago at T/MC.

Among common challenges, Map Kibera documents the "challenges of volunteerism," citing how inspiring volunteers or youth to "take charge of the project is a delicate and ongoing process" for a whole list of reasons. We at T/MC are constantly trying to find volunteers to help with the maintenance and leadership of our GIS/tech-based project

They also point to the difficulty the community (you and me, as well as localized leaders and parents) has in "understanding the larger concept and benefits [of a resource map]," specifically pointing out the general limitation of what people assume maps can do. They report that many people initially did "not see how the map could benefit them or their community since it was only available online and they already knew how to get around."

Additionally, even in Africa, there is results-based skepticism among the "average citizen [who] needed to see the results ... even if they were not able to access the Internet." This is especially frustrating when the map-makers inherently understand the technology but have difficulty "articulating the benefits and potential impact of the map at first." This is one of our biggest challenges and the purpose of this blog - to provide "many discussions, and more importantly demonstrations of the possibilities [of maps], to see comprehension of the potential for technology to bring real change" to our communities.

Map Kibera also points to the challenge of trying to convince other related organizations (in our case, we are trying to build alliances of tutor/mentor programs - but also trying to encourage cooperation among faith-based and other theoretically like-minded groups like the Baptist community featured in the second map above - to join hands in support of at-risk youth). Map Kibera shares our frustration that "organizations do not like to share information ... There are so many organizations that they tend to see each other as competition. A collaborative spirit is hard to achieve, and it is not obvious to many why they would benefit from working together ... Every group was interested in having a map for their purposes; few have the sense of why an open and shared platform for everyone could be even better. The technology world has an ethos of creative collaboration alongside competition, in the spirit of innovation and problem solving. It is hoped that this concept will over time influence organizational behavior."

Despite these challenges, hopefully the "impacts" that an organized, well-invested, map-based project like Map Kibera has had can open eyes to the wisdom of similar programs - such as T/MC in Chicago.

Participants from Kibera, in their own words, according to the Map Kibera wiki, claim to have learned new technical skills, taken new-found pride, and obtained new social/advocacy skills that "may translate to other experiences and support their overall personal development," and could certainly lead to "leadership skills and [a new] sense of responsibility to the community." Tutor/Mentor Programs such as Cabrini Connections have clubs that teach tech skills as well as other media skills that can have these same effects. In fact, Mapping For Justice has worked closely with these clubs in the past and has even developed curricula designed to teach similar advocacy-through-mapping skills, if time and investment ever allows.

In addition to the "personal impact" on participants, Map Kibera documented "community impact," such as bringing "the community closer to legitimacy and giving a sense of being a real neighborhood. Sensitive to external perceptions and its negative reputation, Kiberans appreciate any image such as this map that portrays it in a positive, or at least 'normal' light." Clearly one of our missions has been to supplement the negative news a ghettoized and beleaguered neighborhood like Englewood in Chicago receives, to encourage potential volunteers and business leaders to re-imagine the potential of these neighborhoods' wealth of talented students.

Excitingly, Map Kibera's impact has lead to an increased number of organizations that are suddenly "keen to be represented and eager to learn how they can make use of the map as well as the [program] site to highlight their activities ... Groups that are interested in a variety of issues such as health, gender-based violence, sanitation, new mobile phone services, farm-to-market supply chain, large-scale conflict mapping, peace promotion, and others have contacted the directors to look into collaboration or use of collected data, sparking new thinking on each issue and the potential for the project to move in unexpected directions."

This sort of community participation through the use of maps is the ultimate goal of T/MC's Mapping For Justice project.

Thanks again to my friend who pointed me to the Map Kibera project. It has allowed me to reflect on similar goals, problems, and solutions we are facing right here in Chicago. Hopefully it has also opened the eyes of those who are curious and seeking "proof" that mapping can impact the ways organizations like T/MC can bring positive change to our communities.

(If nothing else, I am at least encouraged someone is thinking of our work at Mapping For Justice when they find a project like Map Kibera!)