Assignment 3 MGMT220 **Scroll down for adjustable sliders**
What is this model?
This model is designed as a simplified field of inputs and outputs for the proposed future justice reinvestment in the north-western NSW town of Bourke. This town is quite small with a total population of around 3,000 people but a worryingly high rate of criminal activity, antisocial behaviour and a generally low sense of community engagement. To plan for a better future this model has been created to map future patterns and changes given certain levels of community investment and policing which can me modified by users, including you!
Key Assumptions & Things to Note: -Model interactions and consequences only focused on the effects of youth not adults. -Total youth population assumed to be 1,500 out of the total 3,000 people in Bourke -Model moves in monthly increments -Model duration is 5 years (60 Months) as this seems like a realistic time frame for such a project plan to span over -Engagement return modification allows between 0 and 6 months return to allow insight into the positive effects a shorter engagement time can have on the community -Police Investment allows adjustment of police force units between 15 and 50 -Community Investment allows an investment of between 0 and 100 to provide a full spectrum of the town with or without investment
Model Prerequisite Understandings: The model commences with 400 people engaging in criminal activity, and a further 300 people already in juvenile detention to provide a more realistic start point.
Model Analysis: The most important message this model shows is that there is no one sided solution for everything. Without community investment, regardless of how many police you have the town is still going to be full of bored people committing crimes - just more will be caught and convicted.
On the flip side a town with no police and only community investment may have a low rate of people in juvenile detention and a high number of people in sports teams - but criminal activity may still be higher than optimal due to a low chance of getting caught.
You can see these results for yourselves simply by adjusting the variable sliders on the bottom right of the page to suit your investment interests. Relevant boundaries have been set to give only useful and meaningful information. Furthermore an engagement return tool has been added to show the effects of a slow or fast engagement pickup time ranging from 0 to 6 months. You will note that things change a lot quicker with a shorter engagement return time.
An interesting thing to note is how evenly 3 of the 4 key data fields in the first simulation display (with the outlier being sports team enrolment) when police investment is set to maximum and community investment is set to the minimum - we see essentially an even split between the 3 possibilities: In town, In Juvenile Detention or engaging in Criminal Activity. a 2:1 split of "bad" to "good" things happening. This shows with certainty that just adding policing with no positive reward or outlet for good behaviour results in a flattened cycle of boredom, criminal activity and conviction.
In this model it also seems that Bourke does require a fairly even but high matching of Police and Community Investment. For example setting the policing at 20 and the community engagement higher at say 50 results in indeed a high intake and output of town to sports team memberships however crime rates do still maintain a steady high dictating a more even match between policing and community investment like 40 and 60 to the former and latter to "eradicate" crime. (Of course this will never be 0 in the real world but it is a positive indicator here)