Scholarship

I also want to clarify that this is for a college and that we are not modeling any other aspect of the college operations. 

I am modeling a similar project.  A completely new pool of dollars has been raised to fund a local community college scholarship scheme.  The scheme has grown into tuition plus books (this has a different fundraising mechanism) and additional new operations (employment) to run the programs.  I am using the same model as explained above.  However, I wondered about scaling.  The project has been running for 5 years and each year the student population has grown.  This would be "new" students not previously thought to destined to college.  So, can I scale the costs for (1) tuition each year and (2) books for each year by the number of students enrolled each year under this new scheme.  Secondly, I am thinking that the "new" operations (employment) for this scholarship scheme should be modeled as either Institutional Spending (State/Local) or Labor Income.  Finally, there is a construction component to accommodate the growth, which was funded with bonds.  Would this be a typical construction approach as explained elsewhere in IMPLAN?

Hello Belinda!

As far as the timeframe of the the project itself, each year you should be modeling points 1 and 2 for the total number of students supported, with the assumption being as you noted that this includes "new students not previously thought to be destined for college". Something important to note here is that these types of Impacts should not be modeled in conjunction with the overall operations of college, as the tuition payments from the scholarship fund would be included in that overall operational revenue value for the college. To model both of these in their entirety would be double counting that revenue. If you intend to model both components, you would need to be sure to subtract the scholarship funds going towards tuition from the college operations.

For the employees that are going to be running the program - are these employees of the college itself? If so, I am concerned that they would actually be accounted for in the increased operations to the Junior colleges, colleges, universities, and professional schools Industry that you are modeling separately. This means that if you model both of these components, you would be overstating the impact of these tuition dollars (as you would be double counting the dollars that help sustain these university employees). If these are other government employees (not working for the school itself), their employment can be modeled using one of the government payroll Industries (Employment and payroll of state or local government, education) in an Industry Employment Event (assuming you only know the Employment value, not their earned income). In this instance, you would be capturing only the Direct Employment and Labor Income of the Employees (with a small amount of Other Property Income). Because these "Industries" do not make Intermediate Input purchases, their would be no Indirect Effects, only Direct and Induced. If these are not government employees at all, they could also be modeled under the private Industry 504 - Grantmaking, giving, and social advocacy organizations.

For the construction component, you are spot on! I would refer you to the construction section of our support site for additional guidance on setting of these types of Impacts.

Hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any additional questions.

Best,

Michael Nealy