Survey says sloppy

I received an e-mail more than three weeks ago asking me to complete a survey about my university and community. I stopped after the second question.

The first question asked if I’m a member of the campus or of the community. As a retired prof, what do I answer? I don’t get emergency text-alerts, because they’re not available to retired faculty, which makes me think that I’m not considered a member of the campus. Retired faculty who live at some distance would seem to be members of neither the campus nor the community. But since I’m a seven-minute walk from campus and have library privileges and free parking for life, I decided to say that I’m a member of the campus.

It was the second question that brought my survey to a stop:

Which picture best represents how closely aligned with [the university] and the community are CURRENTLY in terms of shared goals and concerns?

As written, this question makes no sense: the word with makes it gibberish. For a moment I thought that the question was asking whether I was aligned with the shared goals and concerns of the university and the community. I know of course that the question is supposed to be asking how closely the university and community are aligned. But it doesn’t ask that.

As I suspected, this question did not originate with an administrator in my university. It’s taken from a survey instrument called the Optimal College Town Assessment, a source credited, if obliquely, on my university’s survey form. But someone at my school screwed up the OCTA’s question, which should read

Which picture best represents how closely aligned your campus and community are CURRENTLY in terms of shared goals and concerns?

And I now see that someone also screwed up the survey question that follows:

Which picture best represents how closely aligned with [the university] and the community would be IDEALLY at some future point in terms of shared goals and concerns?

That question should read

Which picture best represents how closely aligned your campus and community would be IDEALLY at some future point in terms of shared goals and concerns?

After stopping at the second question, I wrote a polite e-mail to explain why I thought that the survey needed tweaking. IDEALLY, there would have been a correction. A follow-up e-mail to clarify retiree status and note the troublesome with would have done the trick. CURRENTLY, I’ve had no reply.

Yes, we all make mistakes. But we can correct them too.