I have a related anecdote to share.
When I was taking VPT (Vascular Plant Taxonomy) though we were taught the codes of nomenclature and the rules for pronunciation, the professor himself asked only that we spell them correctly. We (all six of us in the class) didn't need to worry about saying the names correctly, but we had to be aware that there is a single proper method of pronunciation.
My VPT professor was Dr. James Harris of Utah Valley University.
He has a book Plant Identification Terminology - An Illustrated Glossary that is quite useful for botanical studies and is available online. I strongly recommend it for hardcore plant nerds like myself.
