Penn State professor’s film focuses on groundbreaking educator who taught through music, movement

A visit to Gloria Jean Merriex’s elementary school class in the mid-2000s would have included what you might imagine, reading and math books on the shelves, complete sentences and fractions on the white board, and pink-eraser fragments everywhere. But the room was also filled with something most educators rarely see — pure joy and transformational education.

In the recently released documentary “Class of Her Own,” Boaz Dvir, acclaimed filmmaker and journalism professor at Penn State, takes viewers into Merriex’s classroom and introduces the world to a game-changing educator who risked her career to save a community school.

“Gloria believed her students, 95 percent of whom qualified for what today we call universal free meals, could compete academically with anyone,” said Dvir, whose award-winning films include “A Wing and a Prayer” and “Jessie’s Dad.” “They, in turn, believed in her. Together, they made Duval Elementary one of Florida’s top-performing schools.”

Duval Elementary sat just a few miles from the University of Florida, where Merriex earned her education degree. After graduation, she returned to East Gainesville, where she was born and raised. She spent her entire career at the community school.

The first 25 years of her career looked similar to most. Her pedagogy was steered by her education and largely went by the book. Things changed in 2002, when Duval failed the FCAT (Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test).

Because Duval was located in an economically disadvantaged community, the stakes were high.

“After her school failed, Gloria reinvented herself,” Dvir said. “She threw away the pacing guides, wrote a new curriculum from scratch, and infused her math and reading lessons with hip hop, dance, and call-and-response.”

Merriex led Duval from an F to an A in one year and became one of the most innovative and effective teachers in the country.

“My little grandbaby’s 3 years old, and I noticed that she can sing a song over and over and all these words,” Merriex said in an interview used in “Class of Her Own.” “So, we can’t say that kids can’t learn. So I say, well, let me come up with the math rap.”

The FCAT success also brought a financial boost for the school. Duval was allocated by the state $100 per student, which equated to about $30,000 per year.

Leanetta McNealy, vice-chair of the School Board of Alachua County in Gainesville and principal of Duval at the time, said that even though the school was performing well on the FCAT, Merriex did not rest on her laurels.

“You could always hear her talking about what’s next,” McNealy said. “Not only did she teach the children, she connected with the entire family of that student as well as the community around her.”

With the school and curriculum flourishing, Merriex dug in and exemplified a saying she used often, “meet the children where they are, from where you are,” according to McNealy.

Ultimately, Merriex became a support structure for the impoverished community. She taught math and reading classes to parents who wanted to become more involved with their child’s education. She provided food, books, clothes and even money. She also sewed dresses and pants to prepare the children for school functions.

“She was the type of teacher that went over and beyond all of the time. She loved what she did,” McNealy said. “She also never gave herself a break.”

Throughout her life, Merriex struggled with diabetes and the harder she worked, the worse she felt physically. Still, she persisted.

Knowing that her educational model had the ability to effect change and to make a difference in children’s lives, she formed a Math Team that traveled throughout Florida and Georgia. The performances were an exhibition of the power of her curriculum and ultimately caught the attention of the Lastinger Center for Learning at the University of Florida.

In collaboration with the Lastinger Center, Merriex applied for a grant through the Kellogg Foundation to take her innovations nationally. The foundation awarded Merriex $100,000.

One week after signing the grant paperwork, following a full day of teaching, Merriex died on May 16, 2008, of a brain hemorrhage. She was 58.

“Gloria left us a blueprint for student success,” Dvir said. “It wasn’t about rapping or dancing or chanting. It was about making learning fun and relevant to your group of students. It can help any students, anywhere, but particularly vulnerable children still struggling to make up the post-pandemic achievement gap.”

Without Merriex, Duval Elementary lost its academic footing. It closed in 2015.

In March, nearly 16 years after Merriex died, McNealy was approached by a teacher in her district who was preparing for the upcoming state assessments. The teacher had met Merriex at a Math Team performance and wanted to try some of her methods.

In an old box, McNealy found a VHS tape Merriex made. The label read, “Sing along. Rapping with math ... great practice for achievement test.”

“That tape and this documentary show so beautifully her way of teaching,” McNealy said. “There are so many things that I wish she were here to impart. She was truly exceptional.”

Dvir held a rough-cut screening of a former, short version of the film where he was joined by McNealy and Merriex’s colleagues and family members, including her mother, Cenia Merriex.

“I felt Gloria was here,” Cenia Merriex told Dvir. “She was just running late and would join us at any moment.”

“Class of Her Own,” distributed by Allen Media Group’s Freestyle Digital Media, is available for streaming online and on cable and satellite platforms that include Apple TV, Amazon, AT&T U-Verse, Cox, Dish Network, Google Play, Spectrum, Sling TV, Verizon Fios, Xbox and YouTube Movies.

The film was produced by Dvir, Emil Pinnock of Unleashing Giants, and Matthew Einstein of Tradition Pictures. The film is narrated by Tamara Tunie, who portrayed medical examiner Melinda Warner on NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.”