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Go to college, get a masters and teach for 6 years in a South Carolina high school and still do not make $50,000. Right to work state with no union helps keep the pay low. The medical benefits are not so good. I don’t understand why the person stays there. She says loves the south, the people and her job. Go figure. They are now starting to furlough teachers and administration several days a school year to address budget issues.

Thirteen years ago, I was hired by EMU to teach reading/writing/computers (another person taught math)to union auto workers at a Chrysler assembly plant south of Detroit. It was designed as a basic reading/writing program and I had people who were foreign born, some had HS diplomas,many did not, and some were illiterate.

One such student was a janitor at the plant. Because of overtime and regular pay, my janitor student earned over $100,000.00 per year. ( I taught there from 1987-1997) He proudly showed me his pay chits. (My highest year’s earnings was $34,000.00 because I was paid by the university and had to belong to a “technical union” that took monthly dues, required for me to teach, all of which went to democrat causes. If I complained, I feared for getting my car ‘keyed’ or much more. This same student, who did learn enough to sign his name and read the instructions for voting and pass a driver’s test with reading, lived in Detroit and railed at that time against cutting welfare payments for his ‘people’ in Detroit because they wouldn’t know how to work. He also told me that he believed that if you walked into a store, like a 7/11, grabbed bag of potato chips and finished it before you got to the check out, you didn’t have to pay for it. (At that time all super markets were leaving Detroit-and yes I discussd the cause and effect of that with him)

I had also many high ability students who were more than capable but couldn’t write or spell-and were taking college classes where papers were required. Fortunately, I could work one on one with these students.

It was frightening to see how handicapped most workers were with a lack of a good education. These workers were required to check the quality of parts in the plant and enter their results in a computer. I had way too many students who were afraid to answer that honestly because their spelling and writing would be made-fun of by other workers.