I think the idea of a “PR Major” is great.  But I often wonder (mostly in ignorance) - does learning how to write a press release really prepare you for a career in PR?

I wouldn’t know - I was an English major.  And by “English Major” I, of course, mean a college student that was fond of wine.

As it turns out - this job is made up of such a wide variety of odd tasks and completely random assignments that you can’t really be “prepared” for what you’re getting yourself into.

The thing that did provide me with, I think, a decent “preparation” for PR was an education in reading and writing.  Seriously.  I spend more time reading than I ever thought I would.  I simply can’t do my job if I don’t have a feel for what’s happening today, what has been happening, and at least an educated guess of what might happen tomorrow.

I also can’t properly support my clients without the ability to write reasonably well.  I don’t mean to say that I’m a rock-star writer (and this blog does, and should, suggest quite the opposite).  But if you really struggle with writing, you’re really going to struggle with a lot of the stuff you’ll be doing in PR.

So what’s with the PR major?  If reading and writing are so critical to the job, why do so few PR job descriptions mention English majors?  And please don’t get me started on asking why none of the job descriptions in any industry mention English majors…ever.

But it’s worth pointing out - the “basics” of PR are pretty easy to learn.  Executing on the standard tactics is just about as simple as it gets.  So how does an education in PR take you beyond the stuff that you will learn, by default, in the first few months of your career?

I don’t mean to imply that the English major deserves more glory.  Once you’ve read Beowulf, it’s not that you’re all of a sudden smart or an intellectual or “cultured”, rather, it’s a point of exposure to the bizarre, the zany, and the seemingly impossible that does something to the way that you think - it opens up your mind a bit, and helps you to ignore constraints and solve problems in strange, strange, but frequently effective ways.

This could go on forever - but it does get at the heart of the issue, which I believe is: The skills and traits and qualities of a really good PR person are really, REALLY hard to describe - and the job descriptions may never adequately reflect the actual type of talent you are looking for.

Unless you hire an English major to write them… ;)