Teacher receives letter from Trump, corrects mistakes and grades him with a D

ruby orimba

May 28, 2018 3:44 PM

She said she had never ever received a letter with that many silly mistakes

In 17 years of teaching English composition in Greenville public schools, Yvonne Mason had seen these blunders many times before.

Redundancies. Faulty capitalization. Lack of clarity and specificity. But Mason wasn't grading a student paper. She was reading a letter she received from President Donald Trump.

"I have never, ever, received a letter with this many silly mistakes," Mason said.

The former Mauldin High School teacher promptly did what she had done thousands of times before: She corrected the writing and returned it, this one going back to the White House.

Signature

Mason recognizes, of course, that the form letter she received from the president was very likely written by a staff member, not Trump, though the letter does include Trump's signature. It came in reply to a letter she'd written about the Feb. 14 school shooting in Florida.

A photo of Mason's corrections has been widely shared on social media.

"When you get letters from the highest level of government, you expect them to be at least mechanically correct," Mason said.

D Grade

She dinged the Trump letter particularly for repeatedly capitalizing "nation," "federal," "president" and "state," turning these common nouns into proper nouns.

Using her signature purple ink — since harsh red ink is discouraged by some educators these days — Mason identified 11 instances of faulty capitalization in Trump's letter.

"If it had been written in middle school, I'd give it a C or C-plus," she said. "If it had been written in high school, I'd give it a D."

ruby orimba