New York student gets kidney from teacher

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y., Sept. 17 (UPI) -- A teacher in the state of New York says she fulfilled a promise to one of her students by donating a kidney to him.

Boards of Cooperative Educational Services teacher Jennifer Mazzotta-Perretti, 32, said she gave the organ to 19-year-old Kevin O'Brien on Sept. 3, expanding her teaching efforts to include a lesson in generosity, Newsday reported Wednesday.

"It was an awesome feeling that I was going to help this kid with more than reading and writing," Mazzotta-Perretti said.

For O'Brien, getting a new kidney was also a lesson in asking for what you need as he used a class lesson on good deeds to ask Mazzotta-Perretti for a kidney donation should he need one.

Newsday said Mazzotta-Perretti responded to O'Brien's hypothetical question with an affirmative, a promise she later fulfilled when the teen was in need due to an obstruction in one of his ureters.

"You gotta not be afraid to ask for what you need," said O'Brien, who has reported a marked health improvement since the transplant. "I needed a kidney and I have it."