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Before Jonathan Edwards, a running back for the Kuna High School Kavemen in Kuna, Idaho, took to the field with his varsity football team, he tackled a different challenge.

Edwards performed a rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner in American Sign Language for the large crowd in attendance to see the Kavemen’s homecoming game against the Columbia Wildcats.

Christina Edwards, Jonathan’s mom, recorded this footage on September 20. Christina told Storyful the high school senior attended a few ASL classes over the summer with the goal of performing.

“During the homecoming football game he performed the national anthem to complete his goal for his senior project,” she said. “This is one of the games that has the largest attendance and was a huge task to take on.”

She told Storyful Jonathan had to shake off some nerves before performing and “despite his nerves, and limited ASL knowledge, his performance was exceptional and inspirational to people throughout the world.”

Edwards told Storyful she gave her friend Whitney Gustin Pollard permission to post the video publicly to her Facebook page on September 21, where it quickly garnered more than 3 million views. In the caption, Pollard wrote in part, “Jonathan is interested in going to college to become an interpreter after high school!” Credit: Christina Edwards via Storyful