Question Type - Budget/Demographic
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The Budget/Demographic question type builds a separate Budget/Demographic section hidden from your application that allows you to provide a pre-formatted Excel spreadsheet for your applicant to download, complete, and then re-upload. This can be used for capturing budget information and/or demographic information in an Excel format for your applicants to complete, but then have the system convert that data into separate questions for reporting capability.
Once they upload the completed document back to their application, the items they completed in the spreadsheet will populate an additional section built to capture the individual data as individual questions in the budget/demographic section that has been created. This enables you to select these questions and run comparisons across applicants in ad hoc reports and allows you to include the spreadsheet data in your reports as well since you still have the Excel document that they originally completed.
If you have multiple spreadsheets that capture different types of information (i.e. budget data from one and demographic data from another) you will need to create separate Budget/Demographic Questions for each separate spreadsheet you are providing. Every time you build a separate Budget/Demographic question for your applicants it will, in turn, build a separate section just for that spreadsheet.
Since the purpose of the Budget/Demographic Question is only to be able to capture individual data in a reportable format for the Admin, the applicant does not see the Budget/Demographic Section on their application form. It will only be viewable on the back end by the Admins.
The applicant will see the question, download the attached spreadsheet that you have provided, complete the spreadsheet, and then re-upload it to the same question. They see nothing but that question(s).
Since the question is built first, before the section is built, you will need to create the actual question(s) in another section of your application form.
When you create the Budget/Demographic question, the system will also automatically create a separate Budget or Demographic section in the application form that will contain all the questions needed to capture the data from the Excel spreadsheet.
Once you select the Budget/Demographic option in the Type field of a new question, the Template field will display.
Click the green Excel icon to download a copy of the template you will use to create the questions for your new Budget/Demographics section.
Once you open the Excel file, follow the instructions in red in the Notes section, and use this document to build the spreadsheet you want an applicant to complete. You can also add formulas, as needed. Please note the following:
- Column headings and row headings should be unique.
- Leave the first column heading blank.
- Do not leave any row headings blank. Delete all blank rows and the Notes section before saving your file.
- Save your file to your local device and close it.
An example of a formatted file is shown below.
Click the Select Template File option and upload the file. The file name will display, and the file can be removed from the question, if necessary, by clicking on the Delete (trash can) icon.
Complete the remaining fields for the question and click Save & Exit and the question will be saved, and you will be returned to the Question listing for the selected Section. Note the new Budget/Demographic question has been created.
There are two ways you can access the new Section.
1) Click the Sections and Questions breadcrumb, as shown below, to see the new section automatically created when you saved the Budget/Demographic question type.
Click the blue Section Name link, as shown below.
OR
2) Click the blue Question name link in the original section.
Then click the Go to Section Details link under the Template field.
The new Budget/Demographic section will include a question for each of the data cells you created in the Excel file.
The new Budget/Demographic question you created in the original section will display for the applicant as shown below.
The applicant can click on the document displayed to download it. After they populate the document, they can click on the Browse button to upload the completed document. The items in the new Budget/Demographic section will populate with information from the completed form uploaded by the applicant.
Note: You will not be able to make a change to the actual Excel spreadsheet you have provided your applicants while the application is live (published). You must make all changes before publishing the application or after the application deadline date has closed. Then you can clone the application for the following new cycle and make changes as needed.
Best Practice Tip: To make a change to update the spreadsheet you have provided to your applicants; it is best practice to delete the entire Budget/Demographic section and the original question that was used to build that section. Then go through the process to rebuild the question with a new spreadsheet.