It doesn't matter when lay people misuse professional jargon. It matters when professionals speaking to lay people misuse professional jargon. (As was what was being pointed out as wrong about the OP article — it is professional writing, from the PR department of a university!)

In other words, it's about "those who know" being a role model for correct usage by "those who don't know."

(Why bother? Because then people are more likely to come into the profession with an understanding of the concept that's at least compatible with teaching them the model; rather than having an understanding of the model so debased that they need to actively unlearn it before they can learn the correct model.)