Kristi Smith Knutson

“The map is not the territory.”

The phrase spilled easily out of my mouth. I was with one of my young children in a wooded preserve near our Minneapolis home. We were in the heart of the city but hidden, where biking trails and walking paths converge upon a gorgeous urban lake, where one-way roads sneak quietly through trees and marsh and lead abruptly to the traffic and commotion of city streets. We carried a map. A useless map.

“This map is mostly roads. It doesn’t look anything like this,” my daughter said as she gestured to the thick greenery around her.

While I spared my seven-year-old a conversation about metaphor and general semantics (this time!), this phrase and others from the “Coro toolbox” have been housed deep within me for years, informing my choices and influencing even the simplest of conversations.

In the mid-90s I joined the Coro staff as the director of development. For nearly six years I was challenged and rewarded daily by the curiosity, resolve and commitment of the individuals in the vast Coro network—staff, participants, alumni, volunteers and donors alike.

I continue to invest in Coro each year through the Annual Fund because I believe so strongly in Coro’s mission. I see the effectiveness of Coro’s experience-based learning and the unique leadership tools that inspire such significant change in its participants. I see the passion and insights of Coro graduates and the transformations that happen all around us as a result.

And I am reminded, when I least expect it, that Coro is about ideas big and small. It’s about the journey of discovery, one conversation at a time.