Beloved Merced history teacher retires after 25 years of music, mentorship
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- Rivera teacher Robert Malone retires after 25 years in Merced classrooms
- Malone built lasting student bonds through mentorship, music and travel
- District honors Malone as 2025 Certificated Employee of the Year
Rivera Middle School teacher Robert Malone has been teaching in the same classroom for the past 20 years. The room is almost bare now with Malone set to retire after teaching for 25 years in the Merced City School District.
His posters, which have decorated the walls for years, have been packed away. The shelves in the back of the room that used to be covered with projects such as medieval castles his former students created and left for him are now empty.
Many of Malone’s history and English students honored his retirement on recently by walking into class with a large photo of Malone’s face attached to their shirt.
“He’s going to be immensely missed, you know, like at lunch time, he opens up his doors to kids,” said Rivera principal Mystee Schindler. “They just feel really connected to him, even after school, kids who aren’t even his students, gravitate toward him and want to hang out.”
Malone, 64, is one of 11 teachers in MCSD retiring after at least 20 years of service. That list includes:
- Julier Carter – 31 years, third Grade / Peterson Elementary
- Rob Ferreria – 27 years, counselor / Tenaya Middle
- Steve Foreman - 32 years, third grade/Burbank Elementary
- Cheryl Fialho-Hill – 35 years, Kindergarten / Reyes Elementary
- Jamie Formby – 34 years, RSP Teacher / Hoover Middle
- Rogelio Gutierrez – 29 years, sixth grade / Reyes Elementary
- Edith Gutierrez – 21 years/ preschool Lead Teacher / Chenoweth
- Eldini Jesus – 26 years, third grade / Gracey Elementary
- Russell Lawrence – 35 years, seventh grade / Cruickshank Middle
- Sally Oleson – 36 years/PE Teacher On Special Assignment / District Wide
Malone was recently named the 2025 Certificated Employee of the Year by the school district and presented with a plaque at a recent school board meeting.
“You don’t teach for things like that, but it’s nice to be recognized,” Malone said. “It’s nice to know people were noticing.”
Schindler said she’s seen the impact Malone had as a teacher with her own kids.
“He’s passionate about kids,” she said. “He relates to kids really well. Even my own children had him when they attended Rivera and and I just remember meeting him as a teacher, his energy, his charisma, he just, he has a way of just captivating student attention.”
Malone said teaching is sort of the family business. His father was a high school teacher, his sister is a college professor, his brother-in-law teaches high school and his daughter teaches at Burbank Elementary in Merced.
After originally going to college to become a teacher, Malone took a few detours before settling in the classroom. He was part of a rock band that moved to California from the East Coast. He then worked in sales and become a radio DJ. It was while he was coaching youth sports in Merced that he realized he wanted to become a teacher.
So at the age of 39, he started teaching middle school at Rivera.
Why has he loved his profession?
“It’s the impact you can have on the kids,” Malone said. “I mean, that’s what it’s all about. You don’t teach for the money. You do it for the positive impact you can make on kids lives at a time when it’s kind of slippery for them.”
Malone said he runs into former students all the time around town. Kids don’t forget Mr. Malone’s class.
“That happens literally everywhere I go,” he said. “And it’s such a good feeling to know that I had a positive impact in people’s lives.”
Malone is notorious among his peers for going above and beyond for his students. He started the “School of Rock” club at school, which was based of the popular movie starring Jack Black. What started as two or three kids coming into his classroom at lunch to play the guitar with Malone turned into an after-school program that served as an introduction to music for anywhere from 10 to 30 students for the past 12 years.
“It’s awesome,” Malone said. “To see them learn, and one of the biggest things is it gives them confidence. Kids who were afraid to get up and talk in front of the class, but will get up and sing. They realize they can get up and talk, because they can get up and play guitar.”
The “School of Rock” is so popular and has made such an impact on students that the school district has hired someone to take over the program next year.
Malone has spent time coaching baseball, basketball and soccer teams at schools. For 10 years, he worked with other teachers in the district to take groups of students from the area middle schools on a week-long trip to Washington D.C. and New York City each year.
Malone and other district staff members would take a large group of students to see the White House, the Pentagon, Arlington Cemetery, the national monuments and Smithsonian museums in Washington D.C. In New York they would walk through Central Park, visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and take in a Broadway play.
“I love to travel,” Malone said. “I’ve been fortunate and been able to travel to a lot of places around the world, and I see the value in it. I’ve seen how life is different in the Greek islands than here, it’s not the same at all. I just wanted the kids to have the opportunity to travel and see other things, especially the history behind these places.”
Travel will be a big activity for Malone and his wife Toni Guevara as he embarks on his retirement. They have places they want to travel to out of the country and many places they want to visit in the U.S., including a one-month trip planned to the East Coast this fall.
When school starts in August, Malone and his month will be on a month-long trip.
“Yeah, I’ll be waking up at Zion National Park in Utah, having coffee at nine o’clock instead of six, and appreciating the day,” Malone said.
This story was originally published June 9, 2025 at 1:33 PM.
