The University of Texas at Austin's public affairs assistant dean
has issued an apology after a commencement listing for the program's
forthcoming graduates contained a typo citing the Lyndon B. Johnson School of 'Pubic' Affairs.
Even the best writers, reporters and editors fall prey to the
occasional typo. And it's probably bad karma to revel in someone else's
unintentional mistake. But media critic Jim Romanesko reports that the
LBJ school issued an apology via Twitter, reading, "Our
deepest apologies to our 2012 graduates for the egregious typo in our
program. We are working to distribute corrected programs."
Susan Binford, assistant dean for communications at the Lyndon B.
Johnson School of Public Affairs, tells Romanesko that students will be
issued new copies of the commencement program.
"Obviously, we are mortified. It's beyond embarrassing," Binford
said. "As soon as we realized the mistake [on Saturday], everybody went
into overdrive and we went to work to reprint it."
Still, it's interesting how much fuss the omission of one letter can
lead to. No one was killed, no one lost their job and any concerned
parties can rest assured that they will have a corrected commencement
program to reflect upon in the future. But it's not going to stop the
critics of the world from expressing their outrage at the fallibility
of others. Though for most of us, it will probably be remembered with
little more than a quick laugh.