A photo of a professor lecturing at Hebrew University in Israel went viral on social media this week after he consoled his student's crying baby, picked it up, and continued lecturing.
The Jerusalem Post reported Thursday that the lecturer, Dr. Sydney Engelberg of South Africa, encourages his students who have trouble finding sitters to bring their children to class.
One unnamed student did just that, but when the child began crying in the middle of the lecture, she stood up to take the baby out of the room.
According to Sarit Fishbaine, Engelberg's daughter, he stopped her, took the child in his arms, and continued on.
Fishbaine snapped a photo of her dad lecturing with the baby, and posted it to Facebook. The photo and inspiring story quickly racked up tens of thousands of "Likes" and was shared on other networks like Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit.
Many hailed Engelberg as an everyday hero, with one commenter writing, "This is a professor who truly cares about the education of his students. Seriously."
"The reason is that education for me is not simply conveying content, but teaching values," Engelberg said in a follow up
interview with Yahoo Parenting. "How better than by role modeling?"
Allowing kids in class "does seem to be much more acceptable in Israel, which is a very family oriented society and culture," he added. He also said he is a father of four, and grandfather of five, so the move came naturally to him.
After exploring a few photo archives,
Buzzfeed found a treasure trove of pictures showing Israeli professors holding their student's babies in class, and called the practice "Truly heartwarming."