Goodwill of Colorado celebrates Black History Month by sharing the remarkable impact of our Excel Center staff and students. Colorado’s Excel Center is part of a national network of success, which has graduated 13,000 students from more than 40 no-cost adult high schools located nationwide. At The Excel Center Colorado, our students and staff personify the program’s values: grit, goal-striving, adaptability, leadership and integrity.
Many of our students originally dropped out of high school due to family obligations, illness, or other factors that drove them to enter the workforce to help support their family. Now, The Excel Center helps remove those barriers by providing our adult students free drop-in childcare, transportation vouchers, a personalized curriculum, career and life coaching, and most importantly, a network of support built on trust and respect.
Dr. Lizzie assists her English Language Arts students.
The Excel Center students do not pay any tuition, but their investment of time and energy into their studies reaps countless rewards: increased career options and earning power, the satisfaction of attaining their diploma and completing a personal goal, plus the respect and admiration of family and friends.
Recently, Goodwill of Colorado’s Excel Center held its very first graduation ceremony. Our English Language Arts instructor, Dr. Lizzie Louis, read a poem that she composed to honor the momentous occasion. The audience of students, family members, friends and Goodwill staff were mesmerized by Dr. Lizzie’s delivery of her powerful message:
Dr. Lizzie Louis addresses The Excel Center’s first graduating class of 2024.
Urban Scholars
By Dr. Lizzie Louis
These be they that crawl to the altar
These be they that live.
These are scholars bound for success
They look up and they live.
Can you dance in the fire?
Do you know the taste of success
In the bittersweet tomorrows
And in the face of death?
Well, walk with my children
Dance with my girls
Sing with my sons as they
Share with us their worlds.
And before you judge them
Or dare put them down, check this…
You don’t know what it cost them to get here.
Could you even pay the price:
The sweat, the blood, the grit that
It takes them to remain faithful,
determined to transform their life –
against all these odds.
These doctors, these lawyers,
these artists,
Entrepreneurs and voyagers
These students: My teachers
These Urban Scholars: are
Making the world a better place to live.
© Lizzie Louis 2006-2025
We celebrate our Excel Center students, staff and teachers and honor the significant positive impact that Dr. Lizzie is making on our community. She is making history and her legacy will continue for many years to come.