Our Mission & Vision

Our Story

The idea of starting a mentoring program first occurred to our co-founder Noe Brito (Hombres Nobles) in 2009, and it blossomed into a program called Tomorrow’s Leaders when he met co-founders Michael Goen (Men of Strength) and Eric Strong (Roots Historic Arts Society). Each of these directors brought with them unique talents and backgrounds from their own organizations. They agreed to join efforts and focused on working with underserved fifth grade students from North and East Lubbock Title 1 schools. Initially the program consisted of male 5th graders but would eventually expand to include females in 2013. The program from the start focused on lunch visits with our students. Each student would be paired with a mentor and they would be assigned to visit their student on a set schedule throughout the school year. As the years progressed we would add educational activities on the weekends.

The first four years of our program included an end of year field trip which we called our History, Science and Arts Tour. This trip was designed to be both fun and educational. Forty students earned the privilege to participate based on behavior and academic progress. We visited various historical sites in the state of Texas such as Fort Concho in San Angelo, the Alamo in Houston, the State Capitol in Austin and Johnson Space Center in Houston. In 2014, we embarked on our first History, Science and Arts bus Tour of Washington DC and New York City for a 9 day all expenses paid life changing experience. In Washington, we visited the Capitol, The White House, The National Mall, Holocaust Museum and The Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. In New York City, we visited the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, Statue of Liberty, Times Square, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Central Park. Our last History, Science and Arts Tour would take us back to Texas in 2019 before eventually ending our tours due to Covid.

When Covid hit, we were sidelined for a couple of years so we used that time to focus on our organization internally. Up until that time we had no office space to call our own so we began the search for our new home. After three years of searching and praying, we found the one. We placed a bid on an abandoned school building formerly known as Jackson Elementary. This school was left behind as part of the 2018 bond initiative that consolidated three schools into the new Anita Carmona-Harrison Elementary school. In March 2024, in a unanimous vote, the Lubbock ISD school board approved a resolution to reject the bid and decided in favor of donating the building to Tomorrow’s Leaders. The school building is undergoing clean up efforts and will soon be transformed into a new community center and heaquarters for Tomorrow’s Leaders.