Welcome to the Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium (MERC)

MERC is a research-practice partnership between the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth University and school divisions in metropolitan Richmond, Virginia. Established in 1991, MERC works to connect research, policy, and practice on enduring and emerging issues in public, PK-12 education. Explore our site to learn more about our research projects, podcast, reports, events, and services. MERC is part of the Institute for Collaborative Research and Evaluation at VCU.