Student Government just released the data for Blitz Week, a survey given to students on Greene Street the first week of October. The data says students are in favor of the Rate My Landlord initiative and Carolina Closet. The numbers aren’t shocking, as both were designed to help students, but we can’t celebrate just yet.
The problem is that Student Government was only able to find 329 students to represent the entire student body’s opinion. The first problem is with how the survey was conducted. Having only a few central locations might be convenient, but sampling students by choosing them off the street is not a good way to get a general consensus of our student body’s opinion. Our basic-level statistics class taught us that.
SG has shown no lack of good ideas this semester, so surely they can muster the power to create a digital survey to send to university email accounts. They could imitate some professor evaluations and keep sending emails until students respond. It may be annoying, but it’s generally effective.
An online survey would provide an equal opportunity for all students to share their insight. We recognize that there’s no way to get a 100 percent response rate, but greater than 1 percent would definitely be a more accurate and more helpful measurement of student opinion. This pool of responses would give Student Government a much more tangible representation of students’ opinions and give more credible feedback.
We like the idea of Carolina Closet and Rate My Landlord, and we’re pretty sure most students do, too. But SG can’t tout Blitz Week results as positive student feedback, because 50 percent of 1 percent isn’t that much at all. SG needs a better surveying system, and then we can all celebrate the success of their most recent initiatives.