10 Year Time Capsule Project Reunion for the Class of 2006
About Us
We are teachers & students who constantly improved the School Time Capsule Project since 2005 to better motivate more students
Since 2005 dozens of teachers and thousands of students have worked on this project to improve student’s visions of their own potential. Students learned of the fleeting passage of time, and the power they have in studying their own roots and goals to increase their own achievements! A 2008 through 2018 blog was kept over the years. It gives a tedious history until the Covid-19 Pandemic shut down the project in 2020. Find it at https://schoolarchiveproject.blogspot.com, but a summary of the major steps in that history is below.
I am the remaining Project pioneer who retired in 2011 to volunteer with the LULAC National Education Center to keep it going and developing. Executive Director Ray de los Santos has been a tremendous advisor in considering improvements. It is now a very different and much improved project. It was endorsed in 2025 also by the NAACP-Dallas led by President Dr. Sharon Middlebrooks where I am also the sitting NAACP-Dallas Education Chair. What can be celebrated more than the highest Black enrollment Dallas ISD, South Oak Cliff High School, achieving the highest School Effectiveness Indices (SEI) score over all 37 DISD High Schools in 2025? (SOC also won their third Texas State 5A Football Championship within 5 years in 2025! See SEI definition and decades of SEI scores for each DISD school at https://mydata.dallasisd.org/SL/SD/SEI/Default.jsp.)
2005 to 2010
the Basics
The Project started at Quintanilla Middle School, one of the 5 highest poverty schools of all 32 non-magnet middle schools in DISD. The first 5 years were focused and achieved improving graduation rates. Photos were taken of students posing with their letters before putting them into the Quintanilla Vault. In 2009 a teacher had the idea of having parents write a letter to their students about their dreams for them. The principal sent letters to parents requesting such letters.
2011 to 2016 Expansion
Parental letters were very popular with the student so lucky as to receive them but the percentage of such students did not go above 30%.
Also, by 2010 Sunset High School had noticed Quintanilla students as better motivated than the other middle schools. Principal Tovar started a Sunset Time Capsule Project. Greiner & Atwell Middle Schools also started their Projects. By 2016 there were 3 high schools and 8 more middle schools with Time Capsule Vaults!
Class 10-year reunions started in 2015 with wonderful events!
2016 Revolution!
In 2016 Quintanilla was blessed with a Language Arts Coach, Mrs. Niki Lincoln Goff, with brilliant ideas for the project. First, she wanted students to write letters to each parent asking for a letter back about their dreams for their child and a story from family history. This would replace the principals letter. Second she wanted all student in all grades to write such letters and be fully involved in the Time Capsule Project. Over 80% of students received letters from their parents. Teachers were in tears for joy after 6+ years of only 30% of students getting letters from parents! Parents could not ignore a request from their own child as easily as they could ignore a request from the principal!
9 year SEI Record set by failing middle school!
In its 3rd year as a failing school in 2015, the T.W. Browne Principal, Mr. Jonathan Smith, wanted to use the Time Capsule Project to help improve his school. It helped in both 2015 and 2016, but not enough to stop failing. The School Effectivenss Incides (SEI) improved but 2017 would be the 5th year as a failing school for Browne. DISD poured in extra resources and Mr. Smith used the new and improved Time Capsule Project with all students in the school writing each parent asking for letters about dreams and family history! The results were EXCEPTIONAL! In 2017 Browne had the highest SEI since 2008 for any of the 32 DISD non-magnet middle schools, 61.7. That SEI score record has remained ever since! Sadly the new Browne Principal in 2018 did not continue the project. The SEI dropped dramatically. By 2019 the Browne SEI had dropped to 48.4, a 13.3 drop!
The Covid Pandemic killed this Project in 2020. It did not restart in a high school until 2023 when South Oak Cliff (SOC) was willing to give the new project a try. The spreadsheet on the homepage shows the wonderful progress made. By 2025 SOC scored 63.8, the highest School Effectiveness Indices score in all of DISD among all 37 high schools, magnets and choice schools included! Now we are working to keep making such high scores in this value added measure in constantly more schools.
Bill Betzen, (bbetzen@aol.com, place “Roots & Goals” in subject line)
2-20-26