Teacher's Life-Saving Gift Redefines Hero to Some Tough Kids

A’Ja Booth, left, and her teacher, Ndirah Muhammad, walk arm-in-arm into the gymnasium at Detroit’s West Side Academy, where they were celebrated by students – Booth for her return to school after a kidney transplant, and Muhammad for giving the gift that gives their classmate a second chance at life. (Screenshot via MLive.com)

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Teachers are credited with changing and saving lives all the time – whether by recognizing a hidden talent, providing a light in an otherwise dark, rotten existence or simply setting the achievement bar ever higher in a life-changing way that business titans, politicians and other successful people cite when they’re asked about their journeys.

And then there’s Nadirah Muhammad, a physical education and health teacher at Detroit’s West Side Academy.

She gave up a kidney for one of her students, according to reports on the Detroit Free Press and MLive.com.

On second thought, “gave up” isn’t quite the right way to put it.

Muhammad said she willingly offered the organ because it’s the kind of thing people do to help each other succeed. How could she not after reading a short story A’Ja Booth had written about her daily health struggles with a kidney disease?

“If that was my child, I would want someone to do the same,” said Muhammad, 39, a mother herself. “It was a no-brainer.”

Booth’s particular kidney disease, focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, is a devil to treat with medication. Side effects are significant, and the efficacy of drugs varies on a case-by-case basis. Without treatment, renal failure is certain and a patient’s survival depends on a grueling dialysis regimen or a kidney transplant.

That’s where Booth was last May when Muhammad read her story. Three or four days a week for four years, the now 18-year-old left school early to get the life-saving dialysis.

On Tuesday, Booth and Muhammad were showered with glittering confetti as they triumphantly walked, arms linked, down a red carpet and through a cheering throng of students at Detroit Public Schools’ West Side Academy – an alternative school that wouldn’t exist if not for a foundation rooted in second chances.

Tough School, Skeptical Kids

The celebration was a welcome-back party for Booth, who hasn’t been in school since her surgery, but also a call to action to students to consider the importance of serving others.

The West Side Academy is a last bastion of hope for the 500 grades 9-12 students who can’t make it in traditional high schools, either because of their own poor choices or choices thrust on them by circumstances they can’t control. Street smart and skeptical, they’ve been kicked around by life more than most kids. Gestures like Muhammad’s go a long way toward showing them there are people who are willing to go out of their way to help them get it right.

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Muhammad insists that what she did wasn’t that big of a deal.

“I just happened to help my student in this fashion, but I believe that the teachers throughout (Detroit Public Schools) do this every day for their students,” she said in a story on the school district’s website. “I don’t feel that I’m any different. … We are just one family here to help our students succeed in life. And that’s what I’m helping her to do.

At the celebration Tuesday, Muhammad broke it down even more:

“We are here to help, to educate and to serve our students, and this is what I did,” she said. “This is the result of my simple act of kindness, because God blesses us every single day. So what I did, I don’t see as a sacrifice, it was a blessing, and I was happy to have that spirit and to help my fellow man.”

“Redefine What a Hero Is”

Dr. Jason Denny, the transplant surgeon and director of the Living Donor Kidney Transplant Program at Henry Ford Hospital, said Muhammad’s kidney donation “shows that we can redefine what a hero is.”

Encouraging the students to follow their teacher’s example, he told them how to become organ donors through Gift of Life Michigan, adding urgency to the challenge. As of May 1, some 3,505 people in Michigan were waiting for an organ. Of the 2,803 who were specifically waiting for a kidney, 41 percent were African American.

“The original miracle of life is God’s gift. We agree with that,” Denny said. “But right where you are, you can also give the gift of life. Ms. Muhammad did that for A’Ja.”

Overcome with gratitude, Booth choked back tears when she spoke.

“I’m really thankful and blessed for receiving a kidney from Ms. Muhammad. I cannot thank her anymore than anything she has done for me,” Booth said. “I look at her as my second mother.

“We have been going through this for about a year now, but since I’ve had the kidney, it has been successful, doing what I have to do to take care of it. I can’t thank her enough, she is a blessing.”

Booth will graduate on time on June 8, and plans to attend Oakland University, where she plans to study nursing.