UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A Penn State faculty member's documentary will screen June 8 in the protagonist’s hometown of Gainesville, Florida, as part of the city’s "Journey to Juneteenth" Film Festival.
“Class of Her Own” — directed by Boaz Dvir, an award-winning filmmaker and an assistant professor of journalism in the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications — tells the story of Duval Elementary teacher Gloria Jean Merriex’s transformation into a trailblazer who rewrote the curriculum to meet her students where they were and used hip hop, dance and call-and-response to teach reading and math. Refencing the popular ABC sitcom, Forbes’ Peter Greene describes the film as a “real-life mirror of 'Abbott Elementary.'”
“Class of Her Own” focuses on Merriex’s journey. She rebelled after Duval failed the state standardized test, and in one year she led Duval from an "F" to an "A" in that evaluation.
“It’s a great honor to screen this film in Gloria’s hometown,” said Dvir, who also runs Penn State’s Hammel Family Human Rights Initiative. “She could’ve gone almost anywhere but she chose to spend her entire career in the community in which she was born and raised. Through culturally responsive pedagogy, she made learning relevant, meaningful, effective, and fun and helped her students thrive in school — and beyond.”
"Journey to Juneteenth" is the third film festival to make “Class of Her Own” an official selection. The others include the Ann Arbor Black Film Festival, which will screen the 86-minute documentary at 7:30 pm June 1 at the State Theater in downtown Ann Arbor, Michigan, and the Charlotte Black Film Festival, which will determine the screening’s date and time in the coming weeks.
“Class of Her Own” will also screen at 5:30 pm June 12 at the School District of Palm Beach County’s E.L.I.T.E. (Elevating Learners by Innovating Teaching and Education) Summit. The event is free and open to the public.
“As educators, it’s imperative that we venture into unconventional approaches to educate our children,” said Brian Knowles, the district’s manager of African, African American, Latino, Holocaust, and Social Studies. “Gloria exemplified innovative teaching strategies that defy traditional norms, aiming to captivate students and enhance both their academic performance and life prospects.”
The Juneteenth Film Festival’s “Class of Her Own” screening, which is hosted by the School District of Alachua School and the City of Gainesville, is free and open to the public. It will include a 5 p.m. reception at the A. Quinn Jones Museum and Cultural Center.
The festival will screen “Class of Her Own” at 6:30 p.m. at the A. Quinn Jones School. It will be followed by a panel discussion featuring Dvir, whose films have aired and streamed on PBS, the New York Times, Hulu and other major platforms; Leanetta McNealy, vice-chair of the School Board of Alachua County who served as Duval principal during the Merriex years; and Buffy Bondy, University of Florida College of Education professor who studied Merriex’s methods.
Gainesville Mayor Pro-Tem Cynthia Moore Chestnut will moderate the panel.
Recently released on all major platforms, “Class of Her Own” follows Dvir’s “Discovering Gloria,” a documentary short that focused on Merriex’s teaching techniques. Florida school districts and teacher unions screened “Discovering Gloria.” Previewing one of these events, the St. Augustine Record’s Marcia Lane wrote, “How much of an impact can one teacher have on a school? Huge, as filmmaker Boaz Dvir discovered.”