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COLONIE, N.Y. -- Some kids in Colonie got a lesson in saving lives as they learned how to perform CPR at Sand Creek Middle School.

First Niagara is donating 275 "CPR anytime kits" to local schools and sixteen of them went to Sand Creek.

Joey Mendrick, who is a student at school, was one of those involved with the donation. This past spring, his heart stopped when he was hit in the chest with a baseball during a game. His life was saved when someone performed CPR.

Mendrick said, “It happened to me. I needed CPR and we need people out there who know CPR, just in case of these situations, where people have cardiac arrest and no one knows how to do CPR, that's a bad thing, because nobody knows how to save them.”

“It works here in Colonie. With these CPR kits, First Niagara is giving our youth the tools to learn a lifesaving skill to improve the outcome for cardiac arrests for years to come,” said John Bevilacqua, Assistant Chief of Colonie EMS.

The American Heart Association says CPR, if performed properly, can double or even triple the chance for survival in cases of cardiac arrest.