High school student exposes classmates’ abysmal reading skills — as they struggle with words like ‘silhouette,’ ‘extraordinary’

NY Post ^ | 05/03/2026 | Anthony Blair

[DFG]

A high school student in Philadelphia exposed how his classmates are struggling to read easy words and comprehend relatively simple sentences in a viral series of videos.

And he may have gotten in hot water for his trouble.

The videos, posted on TikTok, show the teenagers failing to read a sentence on a piece of paper while being filmed at the city’s Preparatory Charter School of Mathematics, Science, Technology and Careers.

In the clip, made by user “whatthevek” earlier this week, not a single high school-aged student was able to read the sentence, “She wore a silhouette of clothes that were extraordinary but somewhat gauche.”

He made a follow-up video a day later in which the students were apparently unable to make sense of the sentence, “The colonel asked the choir to accommodate the governor’s schedule.”

The two videos racked up a combined 1.7 million likes and thousands of comments, but “whatthevek” later claimed he wouldn’t be making a third due to threats from authorities at Prep Charter.

“I would post a part three, but the school board is trying to expel me, stop me from going to prom, and stop me from walking at graduation. I don’t know chat,” he wrote in an Instagram story on Friday.

South Philly-based Prep Charter, one of the most diverse schools in the state, did not respond immediately to requests for comment.

State test scores show that just 53% of students at the school tested proficient in reading, and just 19% were proficient in math.

The video has sparked outrage, with many calling out the parents as well as the school.

“Yo late Gen Xers and older Millennials have failed their kids so badly. How can you neglect your child so badly, you don’t make sure they can read?!” one X user wrote.

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TOPICS: Education
KEYWORDS: closekthru12; education; philadelphia; whatthevek

[dfwgator]

“Oh see, the deer.”
“Has the deer a little doe?”
“Why soitenly....Two Bucks!”

[Georgia Girl 2]

😂

[napscoordinator]

I’ve found that my vocabulary has increased a ton going into adulthood. These kids will be fine.

[napscoordinator]

Number 9 is nasty. Pay her no mind. She’s definitely a Karen and is snarky to everyone. Her cats supposedly still live her.

[Jim Noble]

Mixing children who should end at eighth grade with children with the potential to become rocket scientists and then trying to teach them both Algebra II using cartoons isn’t good for either of the groups.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

These kids will be fine.

Democrats always say that.

It is never true.

[napscoordinator]

Because you were all knowing out of high school? Doubt that highly.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

I was literate.

These kids are not.

This will be a problem for them.

People who want a slave class will find this acceptable.

After all you do not have to be able to read to be bused into the master's gated community to do his grunt work.

[The Great RJ]

Should it be a shock that kids can neither read or do math, are ignorant of geography and history and can neither read cursive writing nor analog clocks when their classroom is festooned with rainbow flags and their teacher is sporting pink hair, tattoos, a nasal septum ring and a No Kings shirt.

[powerset]

I agree that “silhouette” is strange in the example sentence. It normally refers to an black on white picture showing the overall shape of something, usually a person — sort of a negative backlit shadow.

But Wikipedia adds (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silhouette):
“Because a silhouette emphasizes the outline, the word has also been
used in fields such as fashion, fitness, and concept art to describe
the shape of a person’s body or the shape created by wearing clothing
of a particular style or period.”

I guess not knowing this shows that my STEM orientation has resulted in my becoming très gauche.