Empowering Communities Through Research and Storytelling
How we can help
Research and data are meaningless if they don’t reflect the voices of the people most affected - whether it’s a policy, a program, or a product. Our work blends rigorous methods with storytelling, ensuring that data is lived, shared, and acted upon. We partner with local and state organizations, participants and end-users, advocacy groups, advisory boards, Tribal councils, and community-based organizations to design research, programs, and systems that reflect the real lives of people from under-resourced communities. Browse the menu below and contact us to talk more!
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We conduct community needs assessments that go beyond numbers. Using a mixed-method and human-centered approach relying on surveys, facilitated listening sessions, and one-on-one discussions, we create space for community members, administrators, and frontline staff to share their priorities, challenges, and hopes.
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We support program planning and strategy development that is collaborative, based on data, and equity‑driven. By co‑creating, designing, and refining tailored services with local partners and trusted leaders, we help shape initiatives that are responsive to local needs, evidence-informed, practical, and sustainable.
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We help communities and partners highlight what’s working, what needs adjustment, and how programs can adapt in real time. With deep expertise in mixed-methods research and policy analysis, we help clients move from data to meaningful outcomes. Our goal is to strengthen systems while honoring the people they serve.
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We specialize in disseminating findings in ways that resonate and uplift lived experience. We make sure insights reach decision‑makers, funders, and the community itself. Using human-centered and participatory research methods, we ensure that the stories we tell are authentic, based on evidence, and center solutions co-created with communities themselves.
Portfolio of Recent Work
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Leading the 2025 Community Needs Assessment for the Municipality of Princeton and the Center for Modern Aging to redesign public service delivery and build an Age-Friendly Princeton. Through in‑person conversations, digital surveys, listening sessions, and story‑sharing, we are engaging people who are often left out of formal planning processes. This participatory research is shaping a co‑created vision for public systems that strengthen equity and access across Princeton — ensuring that the solutions reflect the realities of the community itself.
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At Mathematica, Subuhi oversaw a statewide study of California’s Adolescent Family Life Program (AFLP). Beyond managing and leading the project, she sat in the living rooms of young mothers balancing school, work, and childcare, listening to their hopes and the barriers they faced. She met their families, who often carried the weight of multiple jobs while still trying to support their daughters’ futures. Subuhi spent time with tireless case workers who went above and beyond to connect these young women to health care, education, and stability, often stretching limited resources to meet overwhelming needs. And she partnered with the community‑based organizations working from the ground up to reimagine how systems could better serve adolescent mothers.
In partnership with California’s Maternal, Child, and Adolescent Health Division and the Office of Population Affairs, this work helped redesign and strengthen the case management system for young families so that it reflected the realities of the people it was meant to serve. It was a reminder that the most meaningful systems change begins with listening — and that equity is built when policy, practice, and community voice come together. Click here to read more.
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As part of the first national implementation study of the Title X family planning program, Subuhi set out to uncover community‑led solutions that could strengthen one of the nation’s most critical public health safety nets. She oversaw and led her team’s visits to local health clinics and community-based organizations, sitting with public health nurses as they juggled heavy caseloads, observing clinical providers and community health workers as they worked tirelessly to meet patients where they were, and listening to administrators describe the challenges of sustaining services under tight budgets. The team also gathered feedback directly from patients and clients through post‑visit surveys, to better understand why access to affordable, high‑quality reproductive health care mattered for their families and futures.
A partnership between Mathematica and the Office of Population Affairs, this was the first national evaluation of a 50‑year‑old federal program that serves more than 2 million people annually. The insights that were collected helped identify opportunities to strengthen and improve equitable access and quality of care across the Title X network. For Subuhi, the work underscored that the best policy recommendations come from listening closely to the people delivering and receiving care — and ensuring their voices shape the systems designed to serve them. Read more here and here.
About Subuhi Asheer, Founder and CEO
Subuhi Asheer is a passionate and equity‑driven public policy leader and researcher with more than two decades of experience strengthening health and social service systems, particularly for reproductive and maternal health. Grounded in her MPH training from Yale University, Subuhi specializes in participatory research, strategic planning, and program design that reduce disparities, elevate community voice, and improve outcomes for under‑resourced populations.
As a Senior Researcher and Project Director at Mathematica, Subuhi managed multimillion‑dollar initiatives in partnership with federal and state agencies to strengthen programs and refine policies affecting underserved youth, women, and families nationwide. Earlier in her career, she designed culturally responsive programs for immigrant families in post 9/11 New York City and contributed to research at the National Institutes of Health and Rockefeller University, experiences that deepened her commitment to bridging science, practice, and community engagement.
Her expertise include:
Applying qualitative and mixed‑methods research to strengthen the design, delivery, and impact of health and social service programs.
Building trusted partnerships with federal, state, and local agencies, alongside community‑based providers, to align policy with practice.
Leading large‑scale and cross-sector initiatives that co‑create solutions with communities and center equity in systems change.
Designing practical tools and resources that frontline staff and service providers can use to improve daily practice.
Developing and mentoring teams, managing budgets of all sizes, and driving innovation to ensure programs are both accountable and sustainable.
Subuhi’s past work focused on improving adolescent and women’s health and has been widely published in peer-reviewed journals and project-based reports.
About Firefly Research
Firefly’s mission is to chart a path to healthier, more equitable communities through mixed-methods research and program design services. Just as a firefly casts tiny yet brilliantly revealing flashes of light across the night landscape, we illuminate untold stories and bring opportunities for strengthening public services into sharp focus — one story, one experience, one partnership at a time.
Our name, Firefly, is rooted in a deep multicultural tradition that celebrates resilience and hope. We seek to use action-oriented research to empower marginalized voices and drive health equity and justice in our society.