Just had a college grad from the SCAD school in Savannah work as a grip on a shoot a few weeks ago. When I told him to put a sandbag on a lightstand, he immediately walked over to the light and picked up the dimmer, holding it in his hand.
"Uh...sandbag the lightstand..not adjust the dimmer (long silence with zero movement)...bag full of sand...put on stand...(another silence accompanied by blank stare)...do you know what a sandbag looks like? "Yes". Well does it look like what you have in your hand? "No". Then put what you have in your hand down, and put what looks like a sandbag in it, then put that sandbag on the long round thing with three legs at the bottom and a light on top that is right in front of you.
Several more incidents like that.
I asked him later, after a much longer day than should have been, if he had paid to learn TV and film at that school....he said yes, it's very expensive...to which I replied (and I know it was a sh***y thing to say but I was quite frustrated)..."well you should ask for your money back".
Apparently SCAD never did any shoots with field lighting. He was hired because he has a friend that knew the producer, who kept asking if he was doing a good job and why we were falling behind schedule..."well, no he knows absolutely nothing and we're running behind because you hired him instead of the usual guy that knows this stuff. but hey, you saved $150 bucks on the PA....and spending it on me, in overtime."
The kid told me later he learned more about real production in 13 hours than he did in a whole semester at school.
And yes, he came back for the second day of shooting, even though I was given the choice of replacing him. I should have billed for tuition though.