Students leave professor crying with surprise gesture of gratitude on Zoom

‘Teachers deserve the world’

Class thanks professor for teaching via Zoom (TikTok)

A university class has thanked their professor for his efforts and dedication to teaching remotely amid the coronavirus pandemic, with a TikTok of their gesture and his emotional reaction going viral.

This week, Lauren Herrle, a student at Chapman University in California, shared a video of one of her professors, Dr James Brown, beginning the class’s last lesson on Zoom to a screen filled with students with their cameras turned off.

“Is it the new cool thing to do, not turn your camera on?” the professor can be heard asking at the start of the clip. “I’ve heard that. I’ve heard that in some classes nobody turns their camera on, including the instructor.”

After a brief laugh, Dr Brown begins: “Here we go…” before concernedly asking his students: “Seriously, is it my fault that you have your cameras off?”

Herrle then interjects, telling their professor: “So, Dr Brown, we actually kind of wanted to do something,” before asking her classmates: "Everybody, do you want to go ahead?"

The whole class then turns their cameras on, with each student seen holding a sign expressing their thanks to Dr Brown.

“We appreciate you Dr Brown,” one of the signs reads, while another says: “Thank you for making a difference every day.”

“Oh you guys. Oh you’re going to make me cry,” the professor can be heard telling his class in response to the gesture, before starting to cry as he thanks his students.

@laurenherrle13

surprised the sweetest teacher on our last day of class 🥺❤️ ##HolidayCrafts ##CancelTheNoise ##UpTheBeat ##fyp

♬ original sound - lauren herrle

The clip has since gone viral on TikTok, where it has been viewed more than 6.1m times, while another video of the same gesture shared by a different student in the class has been viewed more than 23.1m times.

@notsorry4drippin

#chapman luvs doc brown <33333

♬ original sound - The Boyces

The gesture has also prompted an outpouring of praise, with many sharing that the video also made them emotional.

“Aw this is so beautiful, teachers are so precious,” one person commented.

Another said: “Love this. Teachers who put their heart and soul into their teaching deserve the world. This would mean the world to them.”

According to Herrle, who spoke to Yahoo News about the viral video, their class had taken the course “Lies you learned in school” with Dr Brown this semester, and he was “easily” her favourite teacher.

“We all have a special place for him, like he's easily my favourite teacher,” she said. “He just comes to class with such good energy and he is always singing and humming and talking to us throughout the class and checking in and asking how our day was and making sure that everyone's alright.”