Merit Children's Academy
Licensed Center in Dallas, Texas. License #1806606, issued June 19, 2025.
- Address
- 5835 Penrose Ave, Dallas, TX 75206
- Phone
- (214) 764-0179
- Licensed capacity
- 102 children
- Licensed for
- Toddler, Pre-Kindergarten, School
- Hours
- 07:00 AM-06:00 PM
- Days
- Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri
- Child care subsidies
- Not accepted
Programs listed with the state: Meals Provided, Snacks Provided, Part Time Care.
Openings
This program has not told us about its openings. We only publish what a program confirms itself, so there is nothing here yet. Ring them to ask.
Texas Rising Star
No Texas Rising Star rating
Texas Rising Star is voluntary, and a program joins it by applying. It is tied to accepting child care scholarships, so most programs that are not in it never applied rather than failed. Roughly three in five licensed programs in Texas have no rating.
This says nothing about the quality of this program. What the state has assessed about it is the inspection record below.
Where this is
A map of this address loads when you ask for it. Nothing is requested from the map host until then, so opening this page does not tell anyone which program you were reading about.
The pin is where the US Census geocoder placed this address. About one in eight is interpolated along a street rather than resolved to a building, so treat it as the right block rather than the right doorway. How we source this.
What inspectors checked
Texas HHSC records how many individual standards it evaluated in each area of the rules, and how many it found violated. Across 22 areas it checked 3,839 standards at Merit Children's Academy between November 14, 2024 and June 29, 2026 and recorded 5 violations. Those correspond to the citations listed above that were recorded from 2021 onward; anything older than that is in the citation list but not in these counts.
The 22 areas, one by one
| Area of the rules | Visits | Standards checked | Violated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scope, administration, and communication | 3 | 372 | 0 |
| Record keeping | 3 | 337 | 0 |
| Personnel | 3 | 474 | 0 |
| Ratios and group sizes | 3 | 162 | 0 |
| Activities | 3 | 108 | 0 |
| Infants | 3 | 270 | 0 |
| Toddlers | 3 | 66 | 0 |
| Pre-kindergarten | 3 | 57 | 0 |
| School-age | 3 | 60 | 0 |
| Discipline | 3 | 60 | 0 |
| Naptime | 3 | 36 | 0 |
| Field trips | 3 | 33 | 0 |
| Get well care | 3 | 81 | 0 |
| Nighttime care | 3 | 39 | 0 |
| Nutrition and food care | 3 | 135 | 0 |
| Health practices | 3 | 339 | 0 |
| Safety practices | 3 | 234 | 0 |
| Physical facilities | 3 | 225 | 0 |
| Outdoor safety | 3 | 288 | 0 |
| Pools | 3 | 90 | 0 |
| Fire safety | 3 | 202 | 0 |
| Transportation | 3 | 147 | 0 |
The table adds up to 3,815 of those standards. The remaining 24, including 5 of the violations, were recorded under the state's own catch-all heading, “Individual Standards Evaluated”, which names no area. They are reported here rather than folded into an area above, because the state did not say which area they belong to and we are not going to decide for it.
A high number of standards checked is not a compliment and a low one is not a criticism: how many apply depends on a program's size, its ages served and what the inspector was there to look at. We publish the two counts the state published and do not turn them into a score. This data begins in 2021, which is later than the inspection history above it.
Ask about an opening
This goes to Merit Children's Academy and nobody else. They reply to you directly: we do not sit in the middle of it, and we never pass your details on or sell them.
Tell me about new inspections
One short message each time Texas HHSC records an inspection here, saying that it happened and linking to the record. We do not tell you what the inspector found: a finding without whether it was corrected is misleading, and that pair belongs on the page rather than split across an email.
We ask for nothing but the address, and we send a confirmation first. Your list is never shown to this program, never sold, and every message has a link to stop. An inspection is routine: programs are visited on a schedule and after a complaint, and a visit is not a finding.
State inspection record
HHSC records 19 visits to this operation since October 2017, most recently on July 9, 2026, and 5 citations.
5 of those visits began with Merit Children's Academy reporting something to the state itself rather than HHSC finding it. We publish that because it is part of the record and the state records it separately, not because it is good or bad: a program with none may have had nothing to report. 3,674 of the 12,933 programs listed here have at least one.
- 5High
Every citation below records a correction.
Citations
Showing all 5. Indented text is the inspector's own, reproduced verbatim.
- High November 3, 2025 Correction verified December 3, 2025
746.2805(3): Prohibited Punishments - Grabbing and Pulling
It was determined that a caregiver inappropriately grabbed a child resulting in multiple contusions to the child's arm.
- High October 10, 2025 Correction verified November 5, 2025
746.2805(3): Prohibited Punishments - Grabbing and Pulling
It was determined that a caregiver inappropriately grabbed a child resulting in minor abrasions being left on the child's arm.
- High July 11, 2025 Corrected at inspection
746.3407(12): Mark Cleaning Supplies, Toxic Materials; Keep Separate from Food and Inaccessible to Children
A cleaning spray was left on a shelf in reach of children in the classroom. The operation came into complaince when the spray was moved to the cabinet.
- High July 10, 2025 Correction verified July 29, 2025
746.2805(3): Prohibited Punishments - Grabbing and Pulling
A caregiver inappropriately grabbed a child, resulting in minor abrasions on the child's arm.
- High April 2, 2025 Correction verified April 16, 2025
746.2805: Prohibited Punishments - No Harsh, Cruel or Unusual
A child was handled in a harsh manner when a caregiver forced the child onto a nap mat.
Do you have a child enrolled here?
If Merit Children's Academy confirms you are enrolled, you can tell us what you actually pay. We publish price ranges by city and age so other families know what to expect, and the only reliable source for that is people paying it.
There are no reviews on this site and we are not adding them. We publish the state's inspection record and facts families confirm, not opinions. Your address is never shown publicly; it goes to the program so they can confirm you, and nowhere else.
About this record
Every figure on this page comes from the Texas HHSC Child Care Regulation open data published at data.texas.gov, reproduced as the state recorded it. We do not grade, score or rank programs. A citation is a finding by a state inspector on a given day; it is not a judgment about a program today, and the correction status beside each one is part of the record. This page reflects data retrieved on November 7, 2026. Full methodology.
Operate this program? Write to corrections@childcaretx.com and we will publish your response beside any record here.