Graduate of FDNY-focused high school was inspired to join bravest after friend saved her dad’s life with CPR

One of the graduates of an FDNY-focused high school in Brooklyn said she was inspired to join the Bravest after watching a friend save her dad’s life with CPR — as she and dozens of other students got their diplomas Friday.

Desiree Ruiz, 17, said her father, Wilfredo, suddenly collapsed from a cardiac arrest while a friend was swinging by her family home to drop off a phone in April 2023.

The older boy, who was then a senior at the FDNY Highschool for Fire & Life Safety, quickly began giving him chest compressions.

“He saw my father on the floor in cardiac arrest and went straight into action,” she said.

“[He] definitely saved my dad’s life. Without 10 minutes of oxygen to the brain, you will brain dead. He stepped in at the right time,” she said. “That made such an impact on me.”

“I know that I can make that same impact in society and in the world, because I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes,” she added. 

Ruiz was one of 87 seniors who proudly graduated from the school Friday during a packed ceremony at the FDNY Academy on Randall’s Island.

After her dad’s frightening health scare, she went on to earn a coveted EMS scholarship and the American Federation of School Administration Leadership Award. 

She now plans to become an EMT before being certified as a paramedic, she said. 

The school’s salutatorian, Mia Luna, 17, called her senior class a tight-knit group of future FDNY stars.

“Since we’re such a small school, we’re really connected to one each other,” she said. ”We all look out for each other, and we can leave no one behind.”

“The family aspect of the high school really is, for me, the most memorable part,” she said. 

The school, also known as Captain Vernon A. Richard High School, is named in honor of a Brooklyn-born FDNY firefighter who was killed on 9/11.