For more on anonymity, confidentiality, and privacy:
Anonymous Surveys: When we indicate that a survey is anonymous, it means that we have no way of associating any survey response with the person who submitted that response. If we are utilizing Qualtrics to administer the survey, we may set the survey up in such a way that we can issue prospective respondents personalized links, which are used for targeting reminders to individuals who have not yet taken the survey. However, we have no way of knowing which person is associated with which link or with which survey response. Sometimes, we ask questions about demographic traits on our anonymous surveys. These are used to gain additional insight into the data through breakouts by categories such as race, gender, or class year. We will never report data on a single respondent.
Confidential Survey Responses: Institutional Research (OIR) staff will have access to information about who took a given survey, but this information is not available to anyone outside the office. When survey results are kept confidential, OIR will never associate a survey respondent’s name or ID with their survey response in any kind of reporting. When survey results are reported, they are always aggregated—that is, individual survey results are combined together and presented as a group. Comments submitted on confidential surveys are also never associated with a respondent’s name or ID; however, the comments are reported verbatim in lists sorted alphabetically. Results for groups of fewer than three people are never reported when there is any risk of breach of confidentiality.