La Shondra "Niki" Lincoln Goff

The StudentMotivation.org Project is a 20 year old, volunteer based, open-source, student motivation project that has expanded to serve all grades PK-12. It used to be the School Time-Capsule Project centered on 8th and 12th grade students writing letters to themselves about their dreams and goals for 10-years into their future. 500 & 700 pound vaults were placed in Dallas ISD school lobbies to hold such letters. A series of 5 10-year 8th grade reunions were held before the pandemic stopped them.

 

Student achievement was expanding constantly until Quintanilla Middle School was the highest performing of all 32 middle by 2015, 10-years after the 2005 start of the project.

 

We had attempted for 5 years to have family write letters to students with the principal writing a letter to all 8th grade parents asking for such. This is where Niki Lincoln Goff saved & changed the Project in 2016! She made 2 big changes! She had all students in all grades write each of their own parents and grandparents asking for a letter about their dreams for them and with a family history story in the letter. Immediately the percentage of students getting such valuable letters increased from 30% to 80%! Teachers were in tears of joy for their students! 

 

A team of such leaders as Niki put this powerful project together. In 2016-17 it was used to turn Browne Middle School from a 5th year failing school into the highest performing middle school in all of Dallas ISD in one year!

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You can read more of the story at StudentMotivation.org.