What is the single most embarrassing thing that could happen to a college? Accidentally writing 'pubic' in the school's title in the graduation program, of course. Hands down. No, not down there, gosh.
And with the tagline 'Unlimited Possibilities' ... you just cannot make this stuff up.
To the graduates of the University of Texas Lyndon B. Johnson School of Pub(l)ic Affairs, congratulations. Your graduation is hilarious. We wish you much success in pub(l)ic affairs, an excellent field, even in this economy. Maybe whoever did this should have also shortened the title to the Johnson School of Pubic Affairs. Even better, no?
Evan Smith, the editor-in-chief of Texas Tribune, broadcast the pamphlet on Twitter on Sunday, and the Dallas Morning News just posted a blog about it calling out its stop on Romenesko, where a dean is quoted saying: "Obviously, we are mortified. It's beyond embarrassing ... No one is laughing about this at the LBJ School."
Well, we bet that last part's not completely true, but really, what else could she say? The school is distributing copies of a corrected program.
The school tweeted its apologies, and sent out this letter (via Romenesko):
Dear 2012 Graduates,The cover of this year's commencement program contained an unfortunate typographical error, which has since been corrected and is in the process of being distributed. The error originated with UT Printing, but we failed to catch it. The mistake was inexcusable, and we are mortified. As soon as we caught the error after the programs had been distributed, unfortunately we immediately began work on a corrected version that we will send out electronically and in hard copy to all our graduates, with our deepest apologies. We will send three hard-copy versions to each of you so that you can pass those on to your families and friends. Let us know if you need additional copies. No one feels worse about this than I do, so please accept my deepest personal apology.
With best wishes,
Robert Hutchings, Dean LBJ School of Public Affairs
