A system and method creates a plurality of different ring components for a referenced model included within a parent model. The ring components include values for one or more model-level, block-level, and signal-level attributes of the referenced model. One or more ring components are selected and assigned to the referenced model in the context of the parent model. During execution of the parent model, information from the selected ring component is accessed and used to control execution of the referenced model. During code generation for the parent model, information from the selected ring component is accessed and used to control the code generation process for the referenced model.