Wittig Survivor?
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I went to the University of Alabama at Birmingham where John Wittig taught the PR classes. He was a difficult man to learn under. Students could expect a negative grade on some assignments (like a -20 was the lowest score you could make and even the best students often made negative scores).
The reason he gave for being so challenging was he didn’t want anyone to finish his program who couldn’t write, conduct themselves professionally, or bring a good name to the profession. He said many students chose PR because they thought a communications degree would be easy. He wanted to fail people out of the early PR courses, so that only the best people would go on to work in the industry.
He had such a reputation for being difficult, the people who finished his program were known as Wittig Survivors.
I was wondering if anyone outside of Birmingham/Alabama had heard of him. Or if anyone had a similar teacher/mentor. And if you’re a Wittig Survivor, congrats on making it through.
At the end of the day, I disliked the man. But I respected him.