Student Projects & Work

Community Development Finance Lab

The Community Development Finance Lab taught by Kevin McQueen examines community capital markets through real-world projects and produces working tools that organizations can use every day. 

 

Feasibility Analysis of UPROSE Solar Generation Project, May 2018
The CDFL Student Team (Jody Adams, Hira Babar, Mike Harrington, Michele Marsh, Caroline Thompson, and Dan Wooldridge) developed a financing strategy for the launch of a new community solar initiative sponsored by Brooklyn’s oldest Latino community-based organization, UPROSE. The project, called SunUp, offers community-controlled renewable power generation within the neighborhood of Sunset Park, which would reduce the energy burden for participating low and moderate-income households. The students’ work contributed to UPROSE’s effort to successfully receive funding from the New York City Economic Development Corporation.

NYCEDC press release: First Cooperatively-Owned Solar Garden in New York State Coming to the Brooklyn Army Terminal


Business Planning for the Ironbound Community Land Trust, December 2018
A CDFL Student Team created a business plan for taking a proposed community land trust to scale in the Ironbound neighborhood of Newark, NJ. This project entailed the completion of a market analysis of housing and real estate in Ironbound, along with the development of recommendations for additional funding sources and support available through the city government.


Financing Strategy for the Sunset Park Housing Cooperative, December 2018
A CDFL Student Team developed financial models and identified potential capital sources for various alternative cooperative ownership structures, on behalf of the members of a worker cooperative in the Sunset Park neighborhood. This team collaborated with students from the Design and Urban Ecologies program at Parsons.

 

Public Finance and Fiscal Management

With these blog posts, Debi Chatterjee’s Public Finance and Fiscal Management class lent their voices to current policy debates.

How Much for The Hepatitis C Medication? Global Variation in Sovaldi Pricing
Blogger Illy Auerbach

Reflections on Current Events for Public Finance
Blogger Angela Butela

France’s climate change commitments trigger rising diesel prices and street protests
Blogger Belén Fodde

The Economy is Doing Super Awesome, Right?
Blogger Nick Martin