A Philadelphia teacher who embodied ‘Olney love’ was shot and killed. Ondria Glaze’s school family remembers her radiance.

When Isaiah Sanchez came to Olney High, one teacher saw exactly who he was right away: a good kid who had made some questionable choices but had the heart and smarts to shine.

So when Sanchez got accepted to college and trade school recently, one of the first people he told was Ondria Glaze, the teacher who urged him to go to class more, who got to know his family, visited him in the hospital when he was sick, “turned me around,” said Sanchez, 18.

“She would say, ‘Isaiah, it’s your ideology and your spark that did that,’” Sanchez said. “She was a person that I could always look up to. She just had a radiance to her.”

Glaze, 36, was found dead in her Grays Ferry home Monday, the victim of an apparent murder-suicide, said Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore. Officials believe her partner, 42, killed Glaze and then himself.

But any talk of the tragic circumstances surrounding her death was avoided, the focus remaining on what the loss meant for Olney, where Glaze’s impact could not be overstated, said Michael Roth, the school’s principal, who, like so many in Glaze’s orbit, became a close friend soon after they met.

“She was an angel,” said Roth. “Everybody was her best friend. Everyone is so devastated.”

Glaze was a Philadelphian down to her bones — born and raised in Logan, a product of public schools Logan Elementary, Roosevelt Middle School, and the Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts. She graduated from Delaware State University and, in 2015, began working at Olney, then a charter school, as a paraprofessional.

She seemed born for the work, said Kimberly Simmons, Glaze’s aunt. When Glaze was a child, she always wanted to take care of her siblings and cousins, and when she grew older, she worked at a daycare, Simmons said. She relished working with students with special needs.

“She was just a light,” said Simmons. “She was never negative, always positive, uplifting, just spreading sunshine everywhere she went. That’s why it’s so hard for us that she was taken away doing something that she did so well — loving and caring for somebody.”

Glaze eventually got teaching credentials and became a special education teacher at Olney, where she also served as a cheerleading coach and a class sponsor. When the school returned to the Philadelphia School District fold, Glaze stayed on, committed to the community and to her students. She was part of a committee that chose Roth as principal.

“When she interviewed me, she said, ‘How are you going to bring the Olney love?’ She emulated Olney love to everyone,” said Roth.

Olney is a large high school, with 1,300 students, many of whom have significant needs. The work can be difficult, but it was made much easier and more joyful by Glaze, whom the principal said “was just an encourager. I woke up the night after she passed, and I swear I could hear her say, ‘We got this, Roth, you got this.’”

Glaze loved the Eagles — friends knew not to call Glaze when her team was playing — her family, travel, camping, live music and dancing, and eating out. She was a proud member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority. She was Roth’s karaoke partner, the staffer who raised her hand when the principal wrote a rap about Olney and needed someone to help him perform.

Last year, she started a new “Olney love” tradition with her friend Kelly Wallace, who was Glaze’s co-teacher until Glaze stepped in to become the school’s head of special education. In the past, the school offered staff breakfasts. Around Thanksgiving, Glaze said she wanted to revive the tradition, with a twist — she wanted to cook for students.

“She said, ‘I want to show the students how much we’re grateful for them, so let’s do a breakfast,’” said Wallace. The friends brought in griddles and supplies and cooked pancakes, eggs, bacon and potatoes for Olney students, who ate at festively decorated tables. “She would always joke, she had so many children — she’d call them her son, her daughter, her nephew. She made the kids feel special, every single kid.”

As the counselor for Olney’s special education students, Shawn Donoghue worked closely with Glaze over the past two years.

“She was the best person I’ve ever known,” said Donoghue. “She was just so kind and so positive. Even when we were venting about things, she was still positive.”

Donoghue particularly admired Glaze’s patience and her confidence.

“She did so many things that I was afraid to do because I’d be afraid to look dumb, but she would just do it — that was just who she was,” Donoghue said.

For Glorimar Melendez, Glaze became more than a friend over her eight years at Olney.

“She was my sister; her family became my family,” said Melendez, who also teaches special education students. In Glaze’s honor, Melendez is choosing to focus on what Glaze achieved in life rather than the dark circumstances surrounding her death.

“She’s been a support for us in so many of our situations,” said Melendez. “What else can we do but turn that around and do the same? I have to step in for her with her students. I am telling them, ‘Your school mom isn’t here, but your backup auntie will take care of you.’”

Taking care of people was Glaze’s default. When noises in the classroom were distracting Wisam Chlaibawi, an Olney ninth grader, Glaze bought him headphones — a gesture he won’t forget, said Chlaibawi, who is nonverbal and communicates via typing.

“Ms. Glaze was very nice to me,” said Chlaibawi. “Since I first came to this school, she always made me smile, and when she passed away, I felt very sad.”

The Olney community is planning a vigil celebrating Glaze’s life at 6:15 p.m. on Monday outside the school, at Front and Duncannon. And Roth has begun work on an “Olney Love Ondria Glaze Scholarship” to be given annually to a senior who exemplifies her spirit.

That’s only fitting, said Joseph Peraltan, 16, an Olney 11th grader who vividly remembers sitting across from Glaze in a meeting with his mother about his faltering grades. Glaze went to bat for Peraltan, he said. She didn’t sugarcoat things, but she gave him a path forward, and ways to improve.

Forever after, Peraltan would light up when he saw Glaze in the hallway, he said.

“All my friends, we would all dap her up, but I would give her a hug and ask how she’s been,” said Peraltan, who took posterboard around to students and teachers this week, asking people to write messages in honor of Glaze that are now displayed on her office door.

“She was there for everyone, even when you were at your lowest, she’d get you to the top. She would see us, and she had the biggest smile for everyone.”

Inquirer staff writer Ellie Rushing contributed to this article.