MARCA
Ask MARCA
"Ask MARCA" provides an entry point for residents, neighborhood groups, organizations, and others seeking research support. Queries related to a place-based challenge can be submitted to the Ask MARCA student-faculty research team. The team collaborates with community members to identify, analyze, and translate data in support of local advocacy efforts.
How to Reach out to Ask MARCA
Complete the Ask MARCA Request Form or send an email to marcainfo@memphis.edu. A MARCA team member will follow up with a phone call to help us better understand the research needs and assess the feasibility of the request.
Current and Completed Projects
Agape Child & Family Services: Developing an inventory of data focused on community wellbeing, economic mobility,
education, safety and housing stability.
- MARCA areas: Youth and Neighborhoods
Black Clergy Collaborative of Memphis: Conducted a review of the organization's pre-existing landlord and tenant rights surveys
with a focus on methodological feasibility and clarity for respondents. Ask MARCA
developed two new surveys, accompanied by an outline of additional recommendations
to improve data collection related to their housing justice initiative.
- MARCA area: Housing
Center for Transforming Communities: Compiled existing health, food access, and demographic data to develop a survey around
barriers to health care access to help support the organization's work on the Project
Diabetes grant. Prepare an infographic on diabetes rates in key zipcodes for use with
project participants.
- MARCA area: Health
Dress for Success Memphis: Compiled existing data and developed visualizations around women's labor force participation, unemployment, and sectors of employment across Memphis zip codes. Data and an infographic will be used in grant applications.
- MARCA area: Neighborhoods
Everystory: Analyzed data collected by the organization on a community violence intervention program delivered
at Memphis Allies. Provided interpretation and visualization of findings for Everystory to use in reporting and for program improvement.
- MARCA areas: Neighborhoods
Goodwill Excel Center Midsouth: Compiled existing data around youth high school dropout rates and adult education
and attainment rates in Memphis and the Midsouth to inform program development and
grant applications. Prepared an infographic for reference in grant applications.
- MARCA area: Neighborhoods, Workforce Development
Habitat for Humanity of Greater Memphis:
Distilling a 25+ economic white paper analysis into brief key findings using everyday language and simple to understand visualizations. Results will be used by staff in communicating the impact of Habitat's work in presentations and reports.
- MARCA area: Housing
HopeWorks: Developed a report focused on best practices for work readiness programs with a focus on programs that serve individuals with felony backgrounds in a southern
context. Findings will be used to inform local programming and in grant applications.
- MARCA area: Neighborhoods, Workforce Development
Klondike Smokey City CDC: Built an online inventory of community development in Klondike Smokey City dating
back to the 1910s in support of a community museum initiative.
- MARCA area: Neighborhoods
Knowledge Quest: Completed data entry and developed a report focused on assessing behavior among
preschool-aged students to improve internal data tracking for the Early Childhood
Academy program. Prepared an infographic on data from the Early Childhood Academy
program
- MARCA area: Youth
Memphis Public Interest Law Center: Developed a report about promising practices for commercial building to housing conversion, paired with an inventory of vacant commercial Memphis buildings with a potential for conversion. The findings will inform the feasibility of this strategy for affordable housing development
in Memphis.
- MARCA area: Housing
Memphis Tenants Union: Created a comprehensive database and GIS map of Health and Education Facility Board (HEHF) properties with eviction and code data
as of October 2025, which will inform MTU's housing blitzes that assess tenant housing
conditions.
- MARCA area: Housing
Upcoming Projects
Friends For All: Developing an infographic visualization that simply and clearly explains the PRAPARE screening tool used to screen clients and deliver services that meet health and well-being needs.
- MARCA area: Health
Memphis Inner City Rugby: Developing a report focused on factors that influence upward social mobility for young
people, specifically in a southern context.
- MARCA areas: Youth and Neighborhoods
Women's Foundation for a Greater Memphis: Developing an infographic that clearly explains the PRAPARE screening tool used to screen clients and deliver services that meet their health and well-being needs.
- MARCA area: Health