Dr. Matthews-Juarez is a tenured Professor and Senior Vice President for Strategic Initiatives and Innovation and an adjunct Professor in the College of Life Sciences at Tennessee State University. She serves as the director of the Research Training Core for Health Disparities Research Center of Excellence at Meharry. She has developed and implemented a successful Teaching Academy that linked senior research mentors and community partners with early-stage investigators.

She has established and implemented innovative faculty development programs and plans for junior and mid-level faculty, including a faculty-centered development laboratory staffed by research assistants. She established and implemented the M. Alfred Haynes Research Institute for Social Equity (MAHRTISE), a national career development program focused on training early-stage investigators in the science of health disparities research. Funded by National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, she trained 27 health disparities researchers from across the United States who are conducting health disparities science and publishing. She directs the Joy McCann Endowed Scholar Program for women physicians, an endowment 2004 grant written and received.

Dr. Matthews-Juarez is the Principal Investigator/Project Director for several HRSA (Health Resources and Services Administration) grants, including an MD/MPH joint inter-professional program, a primary care faculty development program at Meharry, a national center on vulnerable populations Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Questioning, persons experiencing homelessness, and migrant farm workers), and a patient-centered medical home project. She is well-published and presents at national conferences on cultural competency, primary care, and COVID-19.

Dr. Matthews-Juarez holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, a Master of Social Work (casework and community organization) from New York University, School of Social Work, New York, New York, and the PhD from the Florence Heller School in social policy, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts.